"I don't like the way Teddy Roosevelt is looking at me."

[sergebroom]

"When I am in California, I am not in the West. I am west of the West."
-- Theodore Roosevelt

Yes, I was in San Francisco from Sunday night until last night. How come? The team I'm with was celebrating the 10th anniversary of our system going live. I pretty much expected I'd have to skip, what with the cost of a plane ticket and money being tight, but before I could say I wouldn't go my new manager took me by surprise by saying they'd pay for the ticket. So off I was to the west of the West, where the streets are crowded with so many gorgeous ladies that I got a crick in my neck from constantly and chastely averting my married gaze.

I had a good time at the office although at first I wasn't sure I would. For one thing, I'd spent many hours without sleep during the weekend overseeing the deployment of a bunch of changes the team had been working on and, in spite of my eagle eye, there were a few hiccups. Most of them were not my fault, but I still expected to get a metaphorical spanking by the time of our weekly staff meeting. That didn't happen, probably because yours truly was quick with taking care of the issues.

Another reason why I didn't know how I'd feel in SF was because of my late-August visit. The week before, Sue and I had driven to southern California and gone to DisneyLand, down the street from where the LAcon worldcon was being held. At the con I finally got to meet some of the people I chat with on Making Light, and the site's co-creator, Teresa Nielsen Hayden, a most considerate woman and nice person all around. I also got quite a few words of praise about my hall costume of a Victorian Time Traveller, especially from author Sean Williams, whose 2-book superduper space opera Geodesica I enjoyed, in spite of some structural problems. I also was quite pleased when I heard someone say "Serge?" and, turning my head, found myself looking at a beautiful woman, a fellow MakingLighter who'd been looking for me and with whom I had a nice chat. The con was good, so was its masquerade, and the Hugo Awards ceremony was hilarious. All this to say I had a fun time that week. Driving up north to SF was then a bit of a shock, with the stressful environment generated by tight deadlines and my new manager getting very nervous over every little thing that wasn't going perfectly right.

So it turned out that my worries about this trip were unfounded. I don't mind being wrong, especially when that means i had a good time. I stayed with Sue's middle sister and her hubby in the Oakland hills, and her mom was there along with Sue's baby sister and her two kids. The 4-year-old one was running around pretending he was a superhero so of course I was conscripted into being the big bad mean supervillain and had to try crushing Our Hero with my foot, but luckily for Truth, Justice and the American Way, Superboy was too strong for the villain to succeed.

Speaking of awesome feats, I've got to go. A Unique Opportunity for Personal and Professional Growth just hit the fan deep in the Tube that office life is.