On the Road Again

We were set to end our voter registration drive on Monday with a bang and spend Tuesday packing and tying up loose ends.  Then Sunday night at 1am I get a text, "Training strts Tues! Fnsh everythng tomorro!"  

We squeezed everything into one day and I had a last hurrah party with the Hampton staff at a director's beach house.  I woke up in a daze, dragged myself off the couch and readied myself to move all the heavy stuff from our offices up to the north.  My arms already hurt from lifting copiers the day before, but it was nothing compared to the hurt in my head.  

We made it up to Richmond, capital of the confederacy, by 1pm.  As phase II of the campaign training went on in the hotel conference rooms I holed up in the coffee shop finishing up payroll and budgets.  After a few hours I got a call telling me to buy a plane ticket, hop in a cab and get over to Denver.

Here's the point where I should have put on the brakes--I have no warm clothes, not much money left and no strong desire to go to a state without beaches.  But instead I spent 1/2 hour on the phone struggling with a computer to buy my plane ticket and spent a restless night on a plane next to a very very fat man in the rear seat that doesn't lean back.

My sole solice was that by the time I arrived at the hotel my posh room had a gorgeous bed layered in down comforters and blankets that I didn't have to share with anyone.  I still woke up sick, tired and juggling both jobs at once.  After another day I was told I'd be sent to Colorado Springs.  If you don't know anything about Colorado Springs, you're probably a good person.  Here's where the religious right has made their home base with mega-churches and the headquarters of Focus on the Family--an vehemenently anti-gay, anti-choice hate group.

Needless to say, it's not a pleasant place.  It's also so very cold.  Since I expected to be able to get my car (and a coat) from LA before October I'm suffering.  I can only think of one other time I was this miserable--waiting in line for 2 hours in below freezing weather and wet shoes to check into my condo in Aspen last year.  I've become so soft to cold weather, I'm not sure if I'll survive the month, let alone a move to Boston.

Sometimes travel isn't fun at all.  Hopefully I'll have better adventures to post about after this election is won.