Chicaaaaagooooooo

I just kept saying it like Oprah would have. I half imagined that I would see Oprah in Chicago, like she would greet me at the airport, hand me the keys to my new car and then take me on a tour of the castle she lived in then show me her favourite things. She did not. I was disappointed.

My work sent my coworker and I to Chicago for a holiday show and meeting. We got a flight from here to Toronto which had the rockiest. landing. ever. Everyone was holding their stomachs, a few people grabbed their spew sacks and I decided this might be the first flight I ever puked on. But we didn’t, yay! My coworker said she never understood why people clap when the plane lands, especially after a terrible landing like the one we just had. I said I always clap because we flew through the air in a giant, heavy, metal tube and didn’t die! I always clap for not dying!

We only had a half hour before our next flight so we raced to find a glass of wine, downed it, complained about the price and selection and then ran to where our plane was boarding. As we got there I saw all of our Ontario regional co-ordinators. So just as the glass of wine hit my empty stomach, I decided to dance over to them, sing to them a song about our workplace and introduce myself to one of the gentleman as the terribly annoying asshole that always e-mails him with the stupidest requests. He was very kind about it and told me I was not annoying at all but I insisted that I was. Then it went kind of silent so I casually moon walked out of there. We filed onto the plane only to figure out that the regional co-ordinators were sitting diagonally to us and we would have to be careful what we said the whole flight. At one point, my coworker, lets call her Sue, was telling me about the time she took her daughter to the hairdresser and was totally devastated when her daughter expressed the need to get an EMU HAIR CUT. I laughed so hard that the co-ordinators turned around to see who the crazy drunk cackler was. It was I, they didn’t look surprised. I was creating a fantastic impression of myself for these people. An emo haircut I corrected her. Emo, not emu.

Sue fell asleep and woke up 15 minutes later saying she couldn’t believe she had slept through the whole flight and then I broke the news to her that she most definitely had just had a power nap and nothing else. I watched some of Horrible Bosses 2 which I look forward to finishing some day as I was laughing out loud at the parts that I did see. The flight attendants told us they packed the wrong plane and there would be no food available on the flight. Perfect, as all I’d had to eat all day was a smoothie and wine. They didn’t even have snacks besides pretzels so I decided to just starve to death as opposed to risking crapping my pants. Flying into windy Chicago it was by far the worst.landing.ever. Everyone on the plane was green, holding their stomachs and had the barf bags out. It was so bad. It was absolutely gut wrenching. Anyways, we made it without spewing, barely. Hurrah!

Every time we got into a taxi in chicago we asked the taxi driver the population of Chicago. The numbers ranged from 300 000 to 8000 to 2 million. It was a running joke. We laughed so hard every time they answered confidently with a totally different, made up answer.

It was this trip that made me realize that my co-worker and I were obviously sisters or something in another life because as soon as we finished the show on the first day we both looked at each other and said it was time for wine. We had all the other girls come hang out in our room that night. Sue said the more I drank, the more I became a one woman comedy show with my language getting gradually more colourful. The next day we had a meeting, packed our things, shopped near the airport (bought a leather jacket!! Not real leather…) and then headed to the airport. We checked into our flight only to realize that our tickets were booked for 6:45 am and not 6:45 pm. The attendant then went on to tell us that all Air Canada flights were full except for one going to Montreal but we would have to spend the night there and get to Ottawa in the AM. We just looked at each other wondering how the fuck this happened, what the fuck were we going to do, holy shit this is such a fuck up! So I took my phone out and took a selfie of us and the Air Canada attendant because that is all I could think of to do…document this terrible moment. He graciously then offered us a direct flight on United for free!!! But it was leaving in a few hours so we would have some time to kill. Amazing!! He saved the day! I have documented evidence of what he looks like! Which sounds creepy. Time to celebrate with wine!

We went to what seemed like the only restaurant in the whole Chicago airport and ate some food and drank a bottle and a half of wine. We stayed there for over 2 hours chatting and mainly drinking. This is when I discovered I may have been a little bit of a light weight with red wine. When we got up to leave and go catch our plane I heard myself utter, I may be too drunk to fly. But then I pulled myself together and made the most of it. As we walked/danced up to the United desk a guy was yelling at the attendants there and getting very mad. He turned to walk away but as he did he came up to us and asked us how a fucking airline can lose your fucking luggage and I started dancing while singing MAGIC and doing jazz hands. He got frustrated and left but I felt I diffused the situation like a champ. I imagine all the passengers were officially getting concerned as I sang and made witty observational remarks about other passengers while waiting for the plane. When they started boarding the plane I moon walked to our seat at the very front! The flight attendant told me that I did not have a place to stow my luggage and I told her I would put my luggage between my legs and just squeeze really tight to hold it, like doing keigals, I yelled. She took the piece of paper she was holding and covered her face as she started to laugh. She eventually told me she would have to stow our stuff with her purse. I gave her my stuff and then yelled that I also had a bag with my new leather jacket in it!! When she came to get it I said, don’t worry It is not real leather, I can’t afford that. The guy sitting next to us turned around and said, you guys are going to be trouble, aren’t you. We both nodded and said yes. They brought the cart around and we bought wine, because thats what we needed, more wine. I tried multi tasking and threw a full glass of wine over my new Rolling Stones sweater I had just purchased a few hours before. That was annoying. Anyways we made it back to Ottawa, pretty hammered and decided we were the perfect travel partners ever! Yay work trips!

Hot Yoga

So I tried hot yoga yesterday. Here is how this happened. Firstly, I have wanted to try it forever because the people that do it are obsessed with it (and toned!) and because my boss has mentioned it to me a couple times to try it with her. So last week when she mentioned it and I said I would go next week, she rolled her eyes and didn’t believe me. That shit pisses me off. I didn’t want her to think I was flaky and said things that I never did. Fuck that, I do what I say y’all. So the next Monday I switched my shift around and showed up with yoga gear. We were going. I was a little worried about it because after not being at a gym for over 2 months, I was worried about being out of shape but I was also extremely concerned about how I would handle the heat. I am not even comfortable in a sauna let alone in a hot room doing weird stretches with a thousand strangers. We got there and I felt immediately intimidated, especially because the class cost $20 which was my last spare change in the bank and I couldn’t believe I had spent it on that and not beer. Ok no. I was intimidated by all the hot, toned yoga bodies and my soft, overdressed body gracing the toned people’s presence. But then when I entered the room and saw how packed it was going to be and how hot it was I definitely had a moment of panic. Could I do this? Will I die? Will I pass out? Will I vomit? Will I be never leave this room of death ever again?

To sum up the experience I found the whole thing pretty disgusting. I know you are supposed to quiet your mind and go inwards but I kept staring at the back of a man sweating so profusely his river of sweat was invading my territory. He was excreting so much sweat that I spent most of the class trying to figure out what he had for lunch because I smelled oregano and garlic so I assumed it was probably Italian? There were moves that I couldn’t even follow and when they did something I knew I had no right even pretending to do, I stood up and casually drank water while occasionally rolling my eyes by accident. Yoga has changed a lot. It used to be about the gong, the fountain, the om symbol, all about the atmosphere. Now it’s about who can shed the most liquids into a pool that slides around in a room of 30 people. It felt weird, uncomfortable and as I ran out of the room at the end, absolutely revolting that I was wading through people’s sweat. I thought to myself, the only way I would consider that room clean ever again was if they burnt it down and built it again.