Walking through the gate into the airport terminal, I realized that this is my 4th visit to San Antonio: 3 pharma conferences and 1 car wash industry event (I got my start on a magazine called Auto Laundry News).
I’ve been through a bunch of airports large and small in the last 10 years. Sometimes I don’t remember a lot about them. I didn’t recall anything about San Antonio until I started walking down the long hallway to the baggage claim and ground transport (I was looking for the latter, since I had everything in my carry-on). It was then that I thought, “Oh, yeah! They had that game room with the Addams’ Family pinball machine!”
And, lo and behold, what was in the next doorway to my right? Showtime! Well, not exactly, since it was 11pm and I was too exhausted from the 4 hours in the air, 3 hours in the airport, and the hour or so I’d spent sawing trees and hauling lumber that day.
But it was reassuring to see the machine there.
The flight wasn’t eventful. Most of us were on the way to the conference. When I walked back up the cabin from the bathroom, just about all the laptops I saw open displayed the logos of various drug companies. The woman next to me worked for a French company that handles pharma packaging (glass containers). Her name was Pascaline. I only mention her because I love the name.
I read and listened to music for most of the flight. The guy across the aisle from me was reading, but he didn’t have any music. What he had was a book with the title, The Way Of The Superior Man: A Spiritual Guide to Mastering the Challenges of Woman, Work, and Sexual Desire. I only mention this because of the title of chapter 16: “Women Are Not Liars.”
Go figure. I read about half of that Portis novel, Gringos.
The first day of the show’s done. There are a bunch of hospitality events going on; I’ve been invited to a couple of dinners and other get-togethers. This is usually a good opportunity to get wrecked on someone else’s dime, but I’m feeling pretty tired just now. I might just take the night off, scare up some room service, watch Monday Night Football, and get back to that novel.
Or I’ll be table-dancing to Thunderstruck at a bar on the Riverwalk. I’ll letcha know.