Good-bye

Well, I'm at Dulles waiting for my flight to London and then onto Sri Lanka. It was quite a week leading up to this moment!

It started with a week of goodbyes. I went home and saw my family including my little nephew and my grandma. I feel it was an extremely successful trip as my nephew totally fell in love with the gorillas at the zoo. He is really a fish kid, but he loved that the silverback was sitting right at the window.

Tuesday my office mates threw me a dessert happy hour. It was crazy, we went to David Gregory and ordered every dessert on the menu. It was incredible -- I highly recommend dessert at David Gregory.

Thursday at work was the "Day of Jessica." The rules were many, but to give you an idea you were supposed to walk, bike or take public transportation to work, you were not allowed to use a cell phone and you were not supposed to eat meat. It was great.

Friday my temporary housemates threw me a going away party. It was nice to be able to see most of my friends before heading out. It was also extremely nice of Christina and Geoff to house me of the last month and then throw a party!

My last week at work I actually spent on the Greenway Sojourn. I only rode a little more than 100 miles, but it was still a great time. The people our Pennsylvania office finds to volunteer on the ride are absolutely great -- incredibly wonderful and funny people. I had two complaints, the rental bike was very uncomfortable (which is why I only rode 100 miles) and some of the participants were very high maintenance. I mean, this ride is only $700 and it is fully supported (meaning food and we carry your luggage). That is a huge deal and people were complaining. Also, you are on a ride with 500 other people, I'm sorry, but you're going to stand in line on occasion. That is just life.

Anyway, I got home early enough yesterday to do laundry. Today I packed, had brunch with a friend, got to run through the Folk Life Festival on the Mall and had my favorite tea (Zhen Zhou Pearls) at Teasism. Then it was off to the airport to see what the damage was with my overweight luggage.

So here is the thing with luggage at most airports. If you look innocent and (unfortunately this is true) white, you can get away with a lot. The woman checking me in mentioned that one bag was overweight and I told her I was prepared to pay the fee. She sent me to pay it and the guy taking the money waved it. Meanwhile, others in line were getting totally harassed about their luggage and carry-ons. They even made several people weigh their carry-ons. My carry-on didn't even receive a blink and I will admit that it is way overweight. So I had one check-in that was considerably overweight and my carry-on is also overweight, but I got through security without any issues and I now sit at my gate waiting to board without paying a dime. Crazy.

So I'll talk to you soon.