Those who know me well understand that I’m someone who likes to have a bit of time to prepare for trips, but recent months have not been kind when it comes to such matters, and I have had to arrange drastic plans with little advance notice and under a fair amount of pressure. Fortunately, such trips have always had positive outcomes that have encouraged me to do my best efforts of planning. As it stands, today I received information for a series of road trips over the next couple of weeks that will apparently result in being a pioneer on a particular project (which I find exciting). The road trips are because the training is (probably not coincidentally) being held in Redmond, Washington, and because that involves two trips up from Portland early on consecutive Monday mornings and two trips back to Portland on two consecutive Friday afternoons.

Those who know me well also know that I am not a particular morning person. As I have joked (not really joking) to friends, there are only two reasons I tend to be awake at 5:30 in the morning. The first is if I’m going on a trip, and the second is if I have a troubled night of sleep (usually from a nightmare, though occasionally from a charley horse as well). In this particular case it will be a trip for work, but at a daunting hour (it will require getting up before 4:30AM!) with people I have never met, which always makes life interesting. Most of my travels, obviously, have been with people I know fairly well, or by myself. Then again, at that early hour in the morning, I do not expect anyone (myself included) to be bright eyed and bushy tales, not least the morning after the “big game” (which should be the subject of a future blog entry this weekend).

So, here is the amount of planning I have to do so far for my trip over the next two weeks:

Receive and fax back the work contract, which I have not received yet because I have had to approve two background searches in the past week as well as fill out a lot of paperwork for two separate companies.

Get a haircut (I would prefer to do this tomorrow, as my hair is starting to look more shaggy than I like and it’s technically already too shaggy for the work regulations).

Do laundry and pack, which I will probably have to do two Sundays in a row. Making sure I was packed and prepared for minimal activity on Monday morning would be good, as I’m not at my best when I wake up early.

Make sure that all of the existing paperwork as well as the call today I made to the hotel worked, and to make sure that the hotel didn’t charge my credit card for something that I shouldn’t be paying.

Clean my pair of black shoes that I will have to use for work and make sure they are shiny.

Whatever else I think of, including trying to make sure that I’m not buried in books when I get back and also seeing if it would be possible to blog during my trip from the hotel.

Anyway, there is a great deal of fun to plan for a trip, especially with food and lodging paid for and the chance to meet people, learn new things, and see a part of a new area without having to go through the awkwardness of planning a visit to a church congregation where I may be less than welcome, as I was concerned I would need to do. From the looks of it, I might end up taking a third road trip to that same area to Tacoma on the 16th if I can get a ride, and I feel up to it, given the fact that I will have to show up for work in Tualatin on Monday morning and might feel a third trip to the Seattle-Tacoma area in two weeks one trip too many. At any rate, I look forward to the trip. It should be fun!