Another weekend, another bunch of travel

I am so tired of traveling. If I could sleep in strange places, or on planes, I think I'd be a happier camper. But since I can't, traveling every weekend means sleep deprivation all weekend, which makes me a very whiny person. Luckily, this should be my last travel weekend in a while, though I am planning on sleeping in a hotel for several nights next week. Have a class for work down in Santa Clara and don't want to do the almost 3 hours commute during rush hour per day it'll be to get down there. But it'll just be me in the hotel room, and it'll be a stable place to stay, so it should be ok.

Nothing about this past weekend was stable. I flew on a redeye Thursday night to Boston, getting maybe 2 hours of sleep on and off during the flight. I got to my sister's dorm room around 9:30am, tried to nap on her bed (and only partially succeeding b/c it was stuffy as hell in her dorm room and she came in and out a few times to talk to my other sister, who was sleeping on an air mattress on the floor) until around 12:30 and then got up to meet my mom. Spent the afternoon with her, walking to Chinatown (and walking back with a bunch of drinks that were nice and heavy) in the rain, getting noodles at Pho Pasteur, and generally chatting with her. Skipped dinner because we had such a late and large lunch, and went directly to my little sister's a capella concert to meet up with my older sister. The concert was lovely - my sister had an amazing solo to "The Tower" by Vienna Teng, which sounded even better than the first recording of it I'd heard despite the fact that she'd been fighting a cough for weeks. It was the last concert of the year so they were saying goodbye to all the seniors, so the evening was an interesting blend of the touching/sentimental, the humorous (they did little skits), and just great singing.

Then it was to bed around 1-1:30AM only to not be able to fall asleep *at all* while sharing a double with my mom. I finally moved to the living room (this was my mom's friend's apartment) to sleep on the couch at 4:30AM and got about 2 hours of sleep between 5-7AM. Then it was time to taxi over to the airport, pick up a rental car, and drive the 5.5 hours to Ithaca, NY, stopping at Syracuse on the way to pick up a friend from the airport (who had his own share of travel difficulties). Had enough time to try to nap for 45 minutes (no luck, the rooms faced a central pool area and there were kids playing and screeching), get dressed, and run off to the wedding we were in Ithaca for. The wedding itself was really nice - on the shores of one of the Finger Lakes, on a sunny day, with the sun shining on the glimmering water behind the happy couple. The reception was also outdoors so I ended up wearing my bf's suit jacket most of the night. Had Chilean sea bass for the first time, which was quite yummy - all melty and not fishy at all. Actually danced a bit even though I'm a crappy-ass self-conscious dancer, and had fun laughing at my friends as they goofed on the dance floor. We knew a number of people at the wedding, so we had a nice evening. I left early, though, around 10:30PM, so I could try to grab some sleep before driving back to Boston the next day.

In bed around 12:30-ish, bf returned at 2AM, waking me up by mistake, woke up again at 4am with a terribly dry mouth..finally woke up for good at 8:30AM thinking I was rested enough, and taking off for Boston around 9:45AM or so. Apparently I wasn't entirely right. The drive the day before had been not great b/c I was tired and my judgment towards the end of the drive was pretty off (pulling into parking places right next to large SUVs that were opening their door), but at least I was pretty much alert and awake if not thinking 100% straight. The drive on Sunday was harder b/c I was sleepier and closer to falling asleep for more of it. Maybe because I wasn't drinking a steady stream of milk tea while driving, as I had the day before. I made it to Boston safely, though, in time to grab an early dinner at the Cheesecake Factory with my sisters and mom for Mother's Day (they had a 45 minute wait even at 3:45PM!). Managed to spend almost 1.5 hours with them before running for the airport in order to return my car and make it to my 6:40PM flight. Finally got home around 11PM only to discover the huge load of laundry I'd left on my bed Thursday night, so I had to fold all that before I could go to sleep.

All in all, a very tiring weekend with some pleasant moments - a nice afternoon with my mom, a great concert for my sister and her group, a nice wedding and some time to hang out with friends - and a lot of driving, travel, and sleeplessness. Whine...