It is currently 5:45am here in lovely Portland, OR and I've been awake since 3:30am. I'm taking advantage of the hotel business center computer since my iPhone got plugged into a bum outlet last night and wasn't recharging.
My traveling cohorts & I started our journey yesterday at 7am when I picked them up in the Prius to drive us all from SLO to San Jose to catch our flight. The drive was uneventful just like I like and the airport was mostly uneventful, save some shuffling when checking bags due to wine bottles. We had about half a dozen Sock Summiteers on our flight and we all gathered and rode MAX (lightrail) to our various destinations. After checking in at the hotel and ditching our bags, my roomie & I headed back to the convention center to register.
On our way down the hill, lo and behold, there is Stephanie Pearl-McPhee leading a cadre of helpers up the hill carrying boxes (Yes, she had a box too). We moved to the side to let them pass and made our merry way down the street where we promptly saw Tina Newton headed toward the same hill. Then I tweeted a picture of the Sock Summit banner. :)
At registration, I got my class list, a lovely show book, badge materials and various tickets for the extracurricular events and kinneared Tina from my phone while my stuff was being gathered. Next thing I know, there are Jasmin & GiGi walking across the lobby! Next up was a visit to the swag room to collect the Sock Summit souvenirs I pre-ordered.
Most folks parted ways to head for their various dinner plans and my new pal, KiniaCat, and I decided to stay close to the hotels and hit Burgerville for dinner. Where we promptly ran into the Knitmores again. This time we chatted with them a bit while we enjoyed our cheesburgers. Again, pics to come but Burgerville does something I've never seen at a fast food place: They put the nutrition information right on your receipt. Dude. Good thing I hadn't had much else to eat during the day!
After dinner we delivered some cookies for ST-1 & ST-2 (aka the organizing goddesses behind this whole crazy adventure) to the registration booth and then went for a walk to Walgreens to get nail clippers that we both sorely needed. After toodling around the neighborhood a bit more, we headed back to KiniaCat's room and then to the 9pm mini-skein swap at the Red Lion lounge...where the teacher's dinner was just letting out. We saw Lucy Neatby with an awesome chicken purse by the elevator and others inside included Stephanie, Tina, Rachel H., JoAnn D., Cookie A, Abby Franquemont, Denny McMillan, Judith MacKenzie-McCuin, Stephen HizKnits, and probably other folks we didn't recognize. One of the swappers had baked sock shaped cookies for the organizers and we took her picture with the cookies, Stephanie & Rachel before being serenaded by a chorus of "Goodnight Ladies" as Steph & Rachel departed for the ST meeting. I had a short chat with Mark & Zoe on the phone before they headed home from Disneyland where Zoe promptly told me "Mama? I'm hungry." She also went on the Matterhorn for the first time and apparently said "I want to go on the Matterhorn again!" as the ride ended. So they did. That's my girl. :) Not long after I headed back to the hotel where my roomie & I compared notes on the day and plans for tomorrow (aka today). Then I promptly laid awake until about midnight and woke up at the aforemetioned 3:30am. At least I got about 10hrs of sleep the night before I left.
Now it is almost time for breakfast and then a visit to Trader Joe's and probably Voodoo Doughnut (I'm still trying to figure out how to get a Maple Bacon donut back to Mark :). Sayonara!
