Florida Work Trip

This week I attended the IASA (Insurance Accounting & Systems Association) Conference in Orlando, FL with a few of my co-workers. We had a fabulous week to leave MN as it was only in the 50's and 60's here, where the Orlando temps this week were in the 80's and 90's~ Yes!

Sarah and I flew out on Sunday morning intended to get to the hotel early to enjoy the afternoon in the sun. However, the weather and the airlines wrote another story for us this day. Our flight leaving Minneapolis was a full one....so full that they decided to leave 2 carts of luggage behind. We did not find this out until we had been waiting for our luggage for 30 min or so....we thought it was kind of funny that a group of like 20 or so people from our flight and we were all missing our luggage. Either way the luggage was on the next flight which was set to arrive an hour later so we decided to wait versus going to the hotel. Outside the storms had decided to come in and it was down pouring, so we prob would not get sun time anyway. The storm did hold up the next flight...so we ended up waiting longer than expected for our luggage to come in but did meet some nice people who were also going to the conference and work at the company Sarah and I used to work for.

Sunday night Sarah and I also met up with Steve & Troy (other co-workers) for a excellent dinner at the seafood restaurant in the hotel. Our appetizer was so fun...I had to take a picture. It was coconut crusted shrimp, but the presentation was awesome in this smoking beaker that held the sauce inside. Pretty cool.

Monday morning officially started the conference and our keynote speaker was Micheal Eisner. His topic was about going for your dreams or vision but keeping within your financial abilities. The remaining of the day was full of different classes or sessions on insurance, accounting, or career oriented topics. Sarah and I did manage to find a little time to catch some rays by the pool, which was excellent. Monday night was a party at the House of Blues in Downtown Disney, which was sponsored by one of the vendors. The four of us definitely had a good time...there was a bunch of food, drinks, and music. The headline act for the evening was the Pointer Sisters, whom once they were playing I was surprised at how many songs I knew. Being nosey like I am, I was able to find this sweet room up in the balcony that overlooked the stage, so we had a birds eye view the whole time. Even when the curtains closed between acts, we were behind the stage and were able to see all the going ons.

Tuesday our keynote speaker was Joe Theisman,whose talk was mostly attitude and inspirational. Again Sarah and I were able to find some time to enjoy a little sun during our lunch break. However, eating by the pool didn't work so well, when I was in the middle of eating my yogurt and went to lean back in my chair and it was not locked so I went from sitting to laying in 2 seconds. It surprised me so much that I squeezed my yogurt which flew through the air and landed all over my belly. Sarah's comment was "Kris, you know that is not how you feed the baby!"

Tuesday night we met up with our old manager from Benfield at the Sushi bar. I had never had sushi and Sarah is a huge fan so I told her I would try some. She was all excited and we ordered a few different items (all cooked for me & baby). I was pleasantly surprised at how good all the items we had were...although we were also told this was one of the best sushi places around. Turns out we didn't really need to eat dinner because our Tuesday night event was a 80's rock concert at the conference center and they also had a TON of food. I just enjoyed he Haggin Das ice cream. :) The concert was by the World Class Rockers which is a band put together of former members from Journey, Toto, Boston, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Santana, & Stepphen Wolf. Since 80's music is right up my alley, it was a fun night.

Wednesday was more of a career development day to wrap up the conference and then we headed home Wednesday night. Two last things about my few days in FL...the hotel we stayed at was amazing...It was the Orlando Gaylord Palms and was set up in a large square that had a 4 or 5 acre jungle type atmosphere in the middle. There were 6 amazing restaurants, although I did not eat at all of them, we did make a stop at each for Sarah. She took part in the hotel's pub crawl by stopping at each place to have their signature drink. Our last stop was Wednesday for lunch at the french buffet for a bloody mary. Way to to Sarah, she is now the proud owner of a Gaylord Palms Pub Crawl tee shirt!