Y9 D262

My second flight was much better than the first, but still not wonderful. I got to the club and sat there until 10. Wandered to my gate, boarded at 10:30. We left around 11. Unfortunately I was too wired from my previous flight that I didn't sleep on that one either. All in all, I got about 2.5 hours sleep in a 36 hour span. Fun stuff.

Got to TN at around noon, my driver was there and waiting. Good guy. On time, good level of chatty, and not preaching at me. Thank goodness. We got to the hotel right around 1pm. They were ready for me. I am on the top floor in the far back corner just the way I like it. No one around me, no noise. I asked them to mark my account for my next trip next month with the same exact room. I like this one.

I now had a whole lot of time to kill. I decided to do something fun. I walked down the street to the TN Aquarium and got myself a ticket. I also opted for the 15 person only backstage pass add-on ticket. I actually got the last spot for the day. The aquarium here is really nice. Two separate buildings, one for fresh water, one for salt. The backstage pass was for the salt and started at 2:30. I had about an hour to wait and did the fresh water exhibits first. Cool, but not overly exciting. A lot of giant sturgeon and the like. River fish don't excite me that much. Remind me more of dinner than anything else. It was the salt side I wanted to see. At 2:30 we started our private tour by going up and above the penguin exhibit. So cool being so close to them. I loved them. They are my new friends. If I could have, I would have smuggled one home. We then went above the main exhibit tank for a close up experience. 618,000 gallon tank with six sharks, two giant sea turtles, and hundreds of fish, mantas, etc. So cool being on top of all of it and getting to talk with the divers who feed them every day. We then got to feed the fish and turtles. I have some great video of the feeding frenzy that happened when everyone started throwing their food in the water. From there it was on to a private hands on with a New Caledonian Giant Gecko. Neat! After that, butterfly gardens, manta ray touch tank, and then the bestest part - JELLIES! All the jellies. It was cooler than cool. It was ice cold. The last thing of course, my friend the octopus. I fucking love octopuses. They rock.

I ended up spending over 3.5 hours there, got a christmas ornament and a pin for B. On the way back to the hotel I stopped at the rib place and got dinner/lunch. Ate dinner in my room, watched some TV and was in bed by 9. I slept mostly okay. The heat was on and I woke up around 2 unable to breathe. That sucked but I managed to fall back to sleep until almost 4.

Two groups of 16 this week. Same class, two days each. Shouldn't be too bad. I have been here before and know the people and the drill. Breakfast in a couple of hours, then I will head over to the client about 7:30.

I am happy to be back on the road. I needed to get out and moving. I get to do this same trip next month on the same dates which is something to look forward to as well.