And now your moment of Zen.

Arrgh! Packing!

I really don't want to pack. I just travelled six consecutive work days: Thursday - the following Thursday, so I've kind of been living out of bags. And I've worked two consecutive Saturdays. I am a crankypants.

I'm getting on a plane in the morning for Vegas, and returning *sigh* Thursday. This will not be Vegas-Vegas, but instead be work-every-single-waking-second-from-Monday-through-Wednesday-Vegas.

I'm taking Friday off, Monday is a holiday, and I'm cranky.

It's a genuine Renaissance, Casey.

So I saw New York City for the first time since May of 2002. I haven't been back since graduation, and haven't really felt a whole lot of desire to do so. Lately, though, I've been slightly nostalgic for Manhattan. I didn't really do anything in New York, since I didn't leave LaGuardia, but I did get some great flybys of the island. I also saw Ground Zero for the first time on Thursday, as we flew north along the western side of the island and I was on the right-hand side of the plane. I specifically didn't go south of Canal the last 8 months or so I lived there because it was still a little too fresh, a little too real. While I don't think I could handle seeing it any closer than I did from the air, I guess it's still a little easier to deal with than it was.

My friend is planning to walk the entire perimeter of Manhattan in a single day. He says it's 30+ miles, and should about 14 hours. Immediately after flying over it and seeing it, I sent him an email on my Blackberry from the tarmac telling him I think he's insane. I walked from Union Square to the history museum right before graduation. Needless to say I took the subway back. I told him that he'll be miserable by hour six.

You don't really get a sense of the size of the island when you're living there. Some days it seems so much bigger than it is, somedays it seems so much smaller. Regardless of the size, it looks awesome from the air.

Care to guess how long this island is?

If you said "Somewhere in the vicinity of Three Miles," you win a prize. The prize: nuclear radiation!

And apparently getting worse.

On Thursday (while traveling Mach .93), I was asked to go to Port St. Lucie, FL next week.

Instead of booking a ticket to West Palm Beach (the closest airport), I'm flying in to Fort Lauderdale, about 45 miles south. This saved $300, and allowed me to get in two hours earlier. The rental car was also $10 cheaper per day from Fort Lauderdale.

So now, my travel schedule for the next two weeks looks like this:

Monday - Fly to Harrisburg, PA and back.
Tuesday - Fly from Columbus to New York City, and then to Fort Lauderdale
Thursday - Fly from Fort Lauderdale to New York City, and then back to Columbus.
Sunday - Fly from Columbus to Dallas, and then to Las Vegas.
Thursday - Fly from Las Vegas to Dallas, and then back to Columbus

And, when I'm in Fort Lauderdale, I'll be doing lots of driving. On my trip to Minneapolis two weeks ago, I put 550 miles on a rental car in two days. Considering that Fort Lauderdale is 109 miles from where I actually need to end up, I would imagine this trip will require significantly more mileage.

I'm going to go plant a tree or something to get over my guilt.

I am bad for the environment.

Tomorrow I'll be flying with two other people on a Cessna Citation X, an 8 passenger jet from Columbus to Milwaukee. We're picking up three people there, and continuing on to Minneapolis. This will burn copious amounts of fuel.

I'll be flying back commercial on Friday, while the people we picked up in Milwaukee and one member of our original party fly back on the Cessna later in the day on Thursday. The Milwaukee to Columbus flight will have a passenger load of one. Horrible.

On Monday I'm flying to Harrisburg, PA and back on the Gulfstream. At least we'll have a full passenger load.

Jeans for the year.

Went to The Gap yesterday and bought five pairs of jeans and a jacket for $130. I'd like to publicly thank my mom for teaching me how to shop.