Kansas City, MO

Hey, y'all!  Greetings from hot and muggy Kansas City. Check out that weather forecast.  Doesn't it look fabulous?  Well, maybe if you like living in sauna.

Ay yay yay!

 

 

 

 

Mike and Bax dropped me off at the Inn in Gig Harbor in the morning so I could take the airporter to Sea-Tac.  It was the first time I've ever traveled alone, and also the first time I've ever left Baxter or Mike since our happy family started.  While I was excited to start on a new adventure with business travel for work, I was also sad (and worried) about leaving my two boys.  Will they survive without me?  Will the house?  Will they eat?  Luckily for me, my mom is retired and enjoys watching Bax, so he's been staying with her since I left.  He even spent the night.  I skyped with them last night after we got back from dinner and was happy to see Bax so well-adjusted without me there (meaning: he didn't really care to Skype and was wiggling all over the place, running around the house and fighting sleep.)  I skyped with Mike afterwards and he was talking about he felt like a bachelor as he went to the grocery store to pick up frozen pizza, energy drinks, and chips for his dinner.

My flight to KC was uneventful, save for the fact that we were packed like sardines in the plane, and probably 90% of the people on the plane had some kind of respiratory gunk going on.  People were hacking and sneezing all over the place, and it sounded like they didn't even try to cover their projectiles.  I kept seeing visions of the snot monsters from the Mucinex commercials whenever I heard someone coughing.  I'm pretty sure that my first souvenir from Kansas City will be TB, the flu, or pertussis.

The humidity here wasn't as bad as I was expecting, but it's still pretty gross feeling after a while of standing outside in "business casual" attire.  The hotel we're staying at is older with modern decor and the smallest elevators I've ever seen.  Also, I'm on the 13th floor.  Are you kidding me?  I get visions of the Tower of Terror every time I step in the elevator.  I didn't think hotels labeled the 13th floor as such anymore.  One of my co-workers is staying in murder central, so named as it is the room farthest away from the elevators and closest to the stairs, which is often where the most murders occur because the perpetrator can get away easily.  (Thanks, CSI!)

One bed for me, one bed for my luggage.

This little guy was waiting for me in my room when I arrived.

The view from my room

CHI has been kind enough to provide us with a shuttle to and from everywhere we need to go, and also arranged for three-course group dinners at swanky places each night.  Yesterday we had dinner at Drunken Fish, a trendy sushi bar a few blocks away from our hotel in the Power and Lights District.  The whole upper floor was reserved for us.  

 

 

 

 

Glowing red tables at Drunken Fish

Today was the first big work day at Cerner.  We're working out of their Riverport Campus, which has an old casino inside of it.  It's pretty neat to walk around in.  I felt like I was in New York, New York Casino in Las Vegas.  Cerner caters our lunches, and we got to eat on a wraparound deck facing the Missouri River.  Apparently the water level is pretty high -- near flood level due to the thunderstorms they've been having these days.  I watched a whole tree float down the fast-moving river into a bog underneath the bridge while I ate my turkey wrap.  I've also discovered that coffee reeeeally perks me up.

Panoramic shot of Missouri River

I'm resting in my room after a long day's work.  It's been fun meeting new people and seeing new places, but I know I'll be even happier on Friday when I get to come back home to Mike and Bax.  I miss my guys!