Sheep Guarding Llama

Tuesday. My busy week continues. Yesterday it was meetings in Pennsylvania. This morning I had to be up early and out the door to drive down Interstate 390 to get down to Big Flats.

I was running early, so I stopped in Bath to see about breakfast at the Taco Bell. But they didn’t have breakfast today. I hunted around town until I found a McDonald’s instead.

I got to the Big Flats manufacturing facility just a little early. I put in a decently long day, but it went really well. Lots of documentation, planning, investigation, and getting to know the people that we work with. This is not a new customer, but one that I have never worked with first hand before and we need to transition them over to understanding who we are now. They had a lot of things to tell us about what had been happening in the past. We learned quite a bit from this visit.

It was a good day. Unfortunately I did not think the travel through very well. If I had, I would have gotten a hotel down in the Big Flats area for the night. Instead I am driving back up to dad’s place, and turning around and doing the same drive back down here first thing tomorrow morning, too, so that I can go to July 4th on the Farm in Waverly which is very close to here.

Very excited, though. I finally get to see the girls again tomorrow. It has been several weeks without them. I hate going even a few days without spending time with them. This has been really hard.

Some time this evening to hang out with dad again.

Monday. I started the day off at the DoubleTree in Youngstown, Ohio. I got up early, loaded up the car, and went looking for a Taco Bell for breakfast. I had to drive around time a little while looking for the Taco Bell. I got to see a staggering amount of abandonment. What a deserted town. It is crazy. It felt like I was in an episode of The Walking Dead. Everything seemed to be dead and empty.

As I drove out of the city to head over to Pennsylvania, it continued. Mile after mile of zero life. No people, no movement, no sign of upkeep. Every house looked like people had just left it there. Some boarded up, some just not kept up. It was really something to see.

My drive over to my meeting in Pennsylvania did not take very long. My meeting lasted several hours. I got a tour of the derelict industrial area of the Pennsylvania border lands. I got to see several towns, and tour a gas station and mini-marked operation.

After my meeting, I drove from the meeting up to dad’s house in New York. Tonight was the only real time that dad and I have to hang out for a bit. Tomorrow I am on the road to work yet again. Then the day after that I have the family reunion for Dominica’s mother’s family down in Waverly.

So I arrived early evening at dad’s and we just spent the evening hanging out.

Sunday. I got up this morning in Louisville, Kentucky at the Tru by Hilton. I got to sleep in as I have not far at all to drive today.

I managed to book a Doubletree Hotel in Youngstown, Ohio, which is very near my meeting for tomorrow. I have never actually been to Youngstown before, even though I have been close to it so many times over the decades.

Today’s drive was just a few hours, and I made great time. There were other cars making a good pace through southern Ohio so I was able to drive with them and it seemed like a barely did a thing today.

I arrived in Youngstown in the late afternoon. I commented to dad (via text) that it looked just like Binghamton, New York. Same age, style, era, and run down in the same way.

I found the hotel and it turns out that it is one that has just been totally refurbished after decades of being closed, and is newly purchased by the Hilton brand. It is a classic property, an anchor of downtown Youngstown, and really critical that it has reopened. You can tell instantly that having it reopen is going to do wonders for this dead city. It’s position downtown could not be more perfect.

I got some time to talk to the general manager and learned that I was right, Youngstown is so much like Binghamton that they, in fact, sent everyone at the hotel to Binghamton for training before opening this one. I showed him my message that I had sent to dad saying how similar the two were just fifteen minutes earlier. We talked and since I was so interested, I was upgraded to the best room in the hotel! Top floor, high ceilings, great view. Best hotel that I’ve stayed in in a long time, and a great rate as I was one of the very first customers. Worked out perfectly.

I called Monica, but she had plans tonight and could not come and hang out. I have a lot of free time this evening.

I went down and had a nice dinner at the restaurant in the hotel. I sat outside on the “square”. It was a great restaurant with wonderful food. And quite busy. The hotel is newer than the restaurant and it was clearly a destination restaurant in town. I had a cocktail with dinner.

After dinner, it was just an early bed for me. Showered, talked to Jenn Jones for a while, have not heard from her for a few years, not since 2013 when we moved out of Dallas the last time. Then sleep. Tomorrow is going to be very busy. I have to travel in the morning, a meeting for a few hours, then a lot more driving up to dad’s.

Saturday and time to finally get up to New York.  I am driving this trip alone this direction.  The drive went well today.  No issues at all.  Looking forward to getting to New York.  But I need to make a stop in Pennsylvania first.  So no way to make it all of the way in one shot.

I did so well driving today, maybe because I have not been driving all that much for a while, that I really felt like I could make the drive all of the way back home without stopping.  But I have a meeting, and I allowed myself two days to get there to make sure that I could make it.  So today could not be a marathon drive even though I was really feeling it.

I decided just north of Nashville that it was time to grab a hotel so that I would have a place to stop that made sense.  I really wanted to keep driving, but it didn’t make any sense.

I ended up getting a Tru by Hilton around Louisville.  It turned out to be a really nice hotel, I like the Tru feel.  It’s a bit more modern.

So I got a nice night of sleep ahead of me.  I stopped early and have very little distance to travel tomorrow.

Friday. Last day at home in Texas. Tomorrow I am getting on the road and driving to New York, or at least starting to. Spent the day working and packing.

This evening, Paul and I went out to Torchy’s Tacos to try it out. It wasn’t bad, but not our favourite. The place was way too crowded. Good taco selection, don’t know how much we are likely to go back, we have lots of potential taco places to go. It did have some decent vegetarian options. Maybe Dominica will want to try it.