Just as we return from our holiday sojourn around Great Britain, the fall conference and meeting season starts.  For me this meant one week to remember what I do in my office before leaving the office again.  First destination: Houston.  A conference and set of meetings that we affectionately refer to as “the poke my eye out with a fork” meetings.  This installment did not disappoint.  My conference presentation rocked – thanks to the participation of my officemate Dave the minion – and then I got to sit in room full of generally intelligent people listening to a consultant discuss how he can fix all our woes.  {sigh}  The highlight of the trip though was a dinner with some friends from NoVA who had headed to the Lone Star state at the same time as we were packing up for KC.  Dinner out with Mark and Beth was wonderful and we got to share tales of new adventures as well as share instances of the joy and pain of watching the kids grow up and move on.  It made the humidity of Houston and the turgidity of the consultant nearly bearable.

But I was not the only one on the move!  While I was languishing in the confines of a branch conference room, many of my friends and colleagues from my previous life in DC had descended on KC for a conference of their own.  I was sad not to be able to be there to show them the best parts of my new home (or be with some of them at the K when they watched the Royals clinch the division for the first time in 30 years — grr!).  I was happy though that one person stayed behind to hang out with me.  Theresa and I met several years ago at just such a conference and were lucky enough to only be two hours apart.  So we could have visits back and forth between DC and Richmond – and now she was visiting KC!

We only really had one full day so we had to make the most of it.  After I arrived back at KCI from Houston, we picked her up and Friday evening was spent in the ‘hood.  She got the walking our of Brookside: up the trolley trail for dinner at Julian and then some Foo’s Frozen Custard before wandering back home.  Saturday’s goal was to do as much KC as we could in one day.  We had a leisurely breakfast on the back deck – pancakes and bacon taste better al fresco – and then it was off to the City Market.  The farmers market was in full swing and we stocked up on goodies from kale and tomatoes to bison jerky and lavender.  Then it was off to the Plaza Art Fair where hundreds of artists stall and  food stands take over the plaza.  The sun was shining and the day was glorious.  We had poutine – Kansas City style so there was BBQ involved – and wandered through the crowds, chatting with artists along the way.

To escape the glorious but relentless sun, we wandered to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art to see how some of the famous people did art stuff.  I had been to the sculpture garden before but never inside the museum.  I was pleased to see a decent collection of Pissaro in the impressionist room.  He really is one of my favorites. Once we cooled down and felt cultured and refreshed, it was back home to grab the picnic and the appropriate garb and then – Destination Kaufmann stadium! We hadn’t failed to notice that every time we take a visitor to the K, the Royals lose. Has to be coincidence, we thought.  So with cheese, charcuterie, veggies and hummus, we made our way to the HyVee view section (read: cheap seats) to watch the Royals take on the Cleveland Indians.  And lose. So much for coincidence.

And so our full KC day was done and it was off to the airport early the next morning.  We had just enough time to get the house in order and get some chores done when another visitor phoned to say he had just landed in KC and how about a drink?  Peter and I worked together in DC, pretty closely in the couple of years before I left, and had become happy hour buddies.  So it was back to the Westin to pick up another visitor.  We had dinner on the back deck (our favorite dining spot these days) – a gourmet feast of burgers, potato salad, kale with bacon and local pickles.  Throw in some cheap red wine and couple of glasses of Virginia port with some good conversation and you have a complete evening.

So come visit – who knows what we’ll have planned!!!