Adventures in San Diego

{our hotel}

I experienced lots of new adventures this past weekend. For the first time in over seven years, Hubby & I went on a little trip with NO kiddies! I've never left my kids before and I was very apprehensive, but I decided to be brave and leave my kids with my parents. My husband’s company had a convention type thing in San Diego and spouses were invited to attend this all-expense paid event. I am so glad I succumbed to the pressure and tagged along!

{interior of hotel ... wish I would've gotten this shot at night

because the fabric hanging from the ceiling turned turquoise}

Our trip started out a bit rocky …. When we arrived at the gate to get on our flight, we found-out that our flight was delayed over 2 hours. I was less than thrilled to spend an extra 2 hours in a stinky airport, but we found some other dentists and their wives and quickly made some new friends which helped the time to fly by. After we landed in San Diego, Hubby & I had to deal with another mess concerning a rental car we were supposed to get and finally after an hour and a half, we called a taxi to come get us. Because we are usually traveling with our kids, we have always gotten rental cars in the past, so this was my first taxi ride ... a somewhat scary ride. By the time we got to our hotel, it was about 11:30pm. We were freezing cold, very hungry, tired & I was not in the best of moods. There was a Fox Sports Grill still open in the hotel, so we headed down to grab some dinner. The restaurant portion was closed, so we ate our dinner at the bar ... another first for me.  Hubby was smart and let me order dinner … mushroom pizza, mashed potatoes, asparagus, and banana bread pudding.

{view from our room}

Saturday morning we were up bright & early for the start of the convention. We had breakfast & then we all went into a huge room with a movie screen two or three times the size of a Harkins screen. Our morning was filled with motivational speakers, a live band, other entertainment, food, food, and more food. I have no idea how many people were in attendance, but I would guess a couple thousand.

{view from front door of hotel}

We were given an afternoon break, so I *dragged* Hubby on a 3 mile walk to Extraordinary Desserts. I had heard rave reviews about their desserts & I kept seeing people at the hotel with little white boxes from there, so I was desperate to go try it for myself. I chose the Dame Chocolat with this description: “This cake is the Grande Dame of chocolate tortes. Dark and intense chocolate mousse sits atop a light layer of flourless chocolate cake creating a richly irresistible chocolate experience.” I figure each bite of this cake cost me about $0.50, but it was to die for!! My new quest in life is to try to duplicate this baby.

On our way back to the hotel, we met up with our new friends, Ryan & Heidi at the mall and chatted a bit.  We found out that Heidi goes running every morning with one of our friends from Pittsburgh, Angie Berni.  Small world.

{heidi & ryan}

Saturday evening, we dressed up in our fancies and attended an awards ceremony which was followed by a nice dinner … the waiters came around and put napkins on our laps for us … nice. We spent most of the day hanging out with our good friends from Pittsburgh, Rob & Ashley. When we moved to Pittsburgh, Rob & Ashley were some of the first people we met. They showed up at our house to help us unload our moving truck and since we lived pretty close to each other, Ashley and I got together to scrapbook a few times. I think Ashley was also my visiting teaching partner for about three years and she was always there for me when I had adoption issues & other problems to complain about.

{ashley, rob, hubby & me}

After dinner, we went up to the “hospitality suite” and we girls did what we do best … sat & talked for hours. :)

Sunday morning I was up before 6am (I have my kids to thank for that!) and I couldn’t fall back asleep, so Hubby & I went for a walk on the boardwalk while we waited for our friends to get up & ready for the day.

We all (Rob, Ashley, Ryan, Heidi, Hubby & me) met for breakfast. The buffet was good, but the best part was just being able to sit there for two hours, casually eat our food, enjoy the view, and socialize with good friends … with no interruptions.

We all shared cabs back to the airport and then 4-5 dental couples took over the rear of the plane & had more fun on the ride home. I hope we can all get together again sometime soon to share good times & complain some more about dentistry!