I Wonder as I Wander…

That title almost seems like a song or the do-ra-mi, but it actually means that I left home in MN at 5 am (which meant I had to get up at 2:45 am) and got to Sioux Falls, SD at 8:30 am. The airport there has an interesting cross between an escalator and a moving walkway. It’s a walkway that’s got a steep incline—which is OK, except when I had a briefcase on wheels that almost ran over the top of me!

I found a copy place (thanks to the lady that lives in the box in my car—that’s a GPS). After I had my copies made, I saw a Barnes and Noble Bookstore and since I had time to kill and my cell phone to charge up—I went in and bought a book (Three Cups of Tea—it’s really good) and hung out. Then I ate lunch and headed slowly for Worthington, MN where I had an appointment at 3 pm.

I had a really good visit with the advisor and one student at Worthington, although the advisor talked like crazy—even asking me for career advice--and then took me to introduce me to her college president and Academic VP. I finally got going from there around 5:30 pm. Hwy 60 goes from Worthington to Sioux City, IA, but it had a detour on it and it must have some new sections because my lady in the box was having a fit that I wasn’t on the road—she must have thought I was going 70 miles per hour out in a corn field. She kept saying “get on the highlighted route” and the picture of the little car was in the middle of a field. I was tempted to pick up the box and show her that I was really on a road. But I think I really appreciate her—I found Kinkos, Minnesota West, and the Holiday Inn Express without any problems at all.

Needless to say, I was beat. The conference started on Thursday at 8:30 am and went until late—a scavenger hunt started at 9:30 pm—although I decided to skip that. Then we went all day Friday. I didn’t have anything schedule for Saturday and Sunday. However, the advisor from the local chapter invited her chapter officers and me to her home for dinner. She is from Iran, so had some unusual food. One was baklava—but not just regular baklava—which she said is the ‘Greek’ kind. She made the ‘Persian’ baklava—it was rolled rather than cut into squares and it wasn’t as sweet as what I’m used to. The advisor was so nice that she send a container home for Bob.

On Sunday, I found a Lutheran Church to attend. I was going to drive around a bit and realized that, since I had been depending on my GPS to tell me where to turn all the time, I had no idea what part of town I was in—so I actually found a map and tried to figure out where I was. I discovered that I was in Sioux City, IA—not to be confused with West Sioux City which is in Nebraska, or North Sioux City which is in SD.

On Monday I drove back to Sioux Falls, SD, visited another chapter and then flew home. I was excited, because I was upgraded to first class from Sioux Falls to Mpls—I thought I’d get my glass of merlot on the way, but it was only a 32 minute flight and kind of rough—so the flight attendants never got up. Darn!