Recovery

Well, maybe the wrong title, but I am recovering from my weekend at SOAR. Wow what a few days it was. Of course, as per my normal state of affairs, there are no pictures. Don't know why I bother to take the camera if I'm not going to remember to use it.

I had only signed up for the two day retreat. Then early in the summer thought a Thursday class would be fun, but alas, was still on the waiting list yesterday. That's okay though, I made flight plans for Thursday, and being my optomistic self (and always trying to think economically) I flew out of BWI at 7:20 a.m. Which meant I was up and out the door at 4:45 since it is a good hour drive. My thought was that at the last minute, the class would have space open. My contingency plan was that of course my room would be ready in the morning, never mind the fact that the hotel states on their website that check in is 3:00 p.m. So as a second contengency plan, I signed up with the Suri Newtwork to do some demo spininng in their booth. What could be more fun and relaxing than spinning suri alpaca, for free?

So, flight was good, it was a little chilly in New Hampshire, but not bad and of course, my room wasn't ready. So I dumped my bags with the front desk and took a walk into town. Manchester is a small town, but full of life and easy to nativate - not that I went too far. There was a nice park right across the street from the hotel and the weekend before had a chili cookoff, sorry I missed that. I found a coffee shop, bought a huge scone and a coffee and headed back to hotel for a comfy morning of knitting in the lobby. Coffee was pretty good, scone was about the worse I've ever had and only ate it because I didn't know when I'd get lunch or if at all and knew not eating till dinner was a bad idea.

I met Lynn at the appointed time and sat down to spin with her wheel. Alpaca, pure alpaca. I stayed in the zone for well more than my two hour time, and shockingly, she said that only one other person had signed up to spin the entire weekend. I know that many people were busy with classes, but really, a lot of people didn't have class on Thursday, and you didn't have to do it the entire two hours. But it worked in my favor, because try as I might no room at the inn for me until 3:00.

I stepped out of my comfort zone a lot this weekend. I'm not a crowds and strangers kind of person. I don't mind crowds if I'm prepared for them (and I was) and I know my limits, so didn't look for a roommate and sucked up the expensive ass hotel fee. And I don't mind strangers, but not usually volunteering to spend an entire weekend with them where I know no one. So, I sat in the lobby before dinner and knitted. A woman sat with me and we started chatting. I was so fortunate to find one of the complainers of the weekend. Ugh. She started in on the food, the continued on how it was horrible, she hadn't eaten and was sick and nauseous. Her husband called while we were chatting, she complained to him, and said if the dinner looked bad she was going out for pizza. After she hung up, she started in again, and then her friend sat down and she complained to her. The friend, on the other hand said she thought the food was pretty good.

We all know that feeding over 300 people at one time is a challenge. I know that, and buffet isn't my favorite way to eat, but I've had some pretty bad retreat foods, so was hopeful. And glad with Ms. Complainer, got up and left. Dinner wasn't too bad actually, there was salad, not a lot of toppings for it, but a few, and red onions, I love those. No croutons which was too bad because the rolls served at each meal were dry and stale, so no bread for me, which was actually okay, and chicken, not too dried out, or tough. Dessert was okay too. There wasn't a lot of options, and I was actually surprised that I wasn't hungry later.

Off to bed at 8:30, because I know my limitations and didn't want to be too tired for my Friday classes. And I had a comfy room. Huge, huge bed all to myself, big bathroom comfy chair with a footstool, lots of space to stretch out, get my stuff ready for the next day, and off to slumber land. By 9:30. Late night party girl I'm not.