G-L-A-M-O-R-O-U-S Business Travel

False.

Growing up in Cleveland, I thought business travel was the height of sophisticated adulthood. My father brought me (and sibling) books and Fannie May treats from his work trips to Chicago. My aunt went further afield to Hong Kong and California, bringing back jade souvenirs and boxes of dates. It was like a exotic caravan stopped at my house whenever business occurred. I couldn't wait to get in on work-related vacations when I was an adult.

20 years later...

Turns out traveling for work is nothing like a vacation. Nothing! True, business trips as a senior designer for a publisher aren't going to be as swank as trips for a CEO of a Fortune 500 company. However, I just returned from a client visit to Grand Rapids and with that fresh in my mind... some observations of business travel reality:

Uggg. Enough already.

1) You're never going to meet sexy, witty people at your hotel. Forget what you saw in Up in the Air. The closest you're getting to sexual tension is being stuck on the fitness center treadmill between a TV playing Basic Instinct (soft core porn) and a mildly creepy older man watching slack-jawed. It is very difficult to catch up on podcasts with Michael Douglas groaning at top volume.

2) Location doesn't matter. You're in beautiful Michigan on a summer day? Well, I hope you enjoy the gray, windowless meeting room that looks the same as the one at your own office. Whoa, you're going to Orlando for two days in October?! Tropical! Oh wait, the conference is at the airport hotel? The breeze off the tarmac sure is nice this time of year. Reality: you've traveled for a purpose and that purpose is to impress your client and go straight home, not to sight-see. Those cool souvenirs I got as a kid undoubtedly came from airport gift shops. Not that they are any less appreciated, just that the notion of a businessperson leisurely strolling through hip local boutiques suddenly seems improbable.

3) You will feel like a child, but shake it off. This is a pitfall of my own making. I have not owned a proper suit since I was a senior in high school. Despite this, I have landed several jobs and am not a slob. I think "arty folk" get a bit of a pass on business dress. However, even if that pass is accepted, standing amid a group of suit-wearers in classy, but non-suit attire, will make you feel like an infant. Can I just solve this problem by buying a suit? Yes. But A) I hate suits B) They are expensive and C) I'd rarely wear it. So I suck it up in my business casual black pants and present my heart out anyhow.

4) If you can, drive there. I guess if you hate driving, this is not an option. Plus, anything over five hours is probably impractical in a car. But, life is a highway, man, and I'd rather have the wind in my hair for a short trip. The TSA frowns on travelers tunelessly belting out "Tiny Dancer" in security lines. No such law in the Interstate system. Thank God.

Could be worse.

5) Be careful what you pack. There is a chance that valued co-workers will see your belongings at some point, so pack conservatively. On my recent trip, co-worker #1 went to the car to fetch a computer cord from co-worker #2's suitcase. Co-worker #1 returned with my hot pink, mini hair iron, asking "Is this it?" Wrong bag! But a good reminder that people you respect are in positions to literally see your dirty laundry. (PS- the mini flatiron might be the best accidental TJMaxx find ever. Great for travel!)

I could probably keep this list going for quite some time, but five seems like a nice round number. Readers, what joys have you discovered in your own business travel lives?

A Year in Review: My Own Unnecessary List.

The blogosphere is simply bloated with "Top 10 Things!" or "Arbitrary Best of That" articles this time of year. This could be because humans are naturally attracted to lists (just me?). A more likely scenario is that post-Thanksgiving, bloggers start a slow, cookie-enhanced descent to laziness. Lists are way easier than writing something hard, like, with themes and metaphors.

The blogger description is highly questionable, but I am feeling lazy and have consumed an ungodly amount of bakery. Plus I promised myself I'd squeeze one last post into 2010. Let's hit it!

He Who Rules the Mob

Morning, readers! I am pleased to report that all City Dangers bloggers survived The Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear in D.C. this past weekend. Despite the estimated 200,000-strong crowd, and the huge potential for disaster, the day was a certified success... filled with sunshine, media-skewering jokes, and naturally, Ozzy Osbourne & Cat Stevens performing a duet.

A moderate and sane bottleneck.

While the politeness of the masses was appreciated at the time, it created a gaping void of topics for a new blog post. I was so sure we'd have a brilliant lesson in danger come out of the day, but in the end we were only moderately inconvenienced by a bottleneck upon exiting. Even then we had hilarious signs to entertain us. I'll leave it to my fellow blogger to hone in on any other slight Rally dangers.

But to take a cue from Stephen Colbert's fear theme, good-humored masses could VERY easily turn into an unruly mob at any moment. In fact, I encountered a much more dangerous group scenario at Reagan National Airport on my way home to Chicago.