Best part of my day

Yesterday, I arrived at LAX, met Sarah, the tour intern, then spent an hour or so getting our rental car. It's spring break, so very busy in the rental car industry. Or maybe it's just L.A.

We drove back through the arrival lane just in time to sweep up Megan and Kristy, who had arrived from Sacramento (Megan had flown from Japan on the 20th). The Shidara 2008 US Tour has begun!

I'm still recovering from the nasty flu thing that I got two days before leaving Tucson. It's definitely put a damper on things for me, but there's so much going on, and so much of it good, that it doesn't hold me back much.

This has been a very gentle beginning, quite lovely, actually. We've got rooms at the Sheraton across the court from the Performing Center, which is gorgeous. The colored tile and long flags high up in the damp breeze. There' huge expanses of grass, thick and green. Bugsy would love it.

There's vast up-scale suburban mall across the street the other way, with Borders and Walmart and a food court. We scored a printer/scanner/copier for $49, and picked up various other little necessaries for the tour: a plastic measuring cup, a new toothbrush, a case of water, etc. Plus, my priceline karma (car-ma) has held steady. I decided to upgrade the compact vehicle I'd gotten (for less than half the going rate!) because we were going to try to make it back from the airport the next day in one car and one 15-passenger van (there would be 11 international travelers, their luggage and several shime, and two U.S. staff to fit. So I asked for a full-size car (which the guy only charged me $12 more for) and found, once we'd gotten a lift in a passing golf cart out to our rental, that it was a Rav4. Pretty. Clean. White. New.

And it was the same story with the van this morning (although that was more due to Megan's good eye than my car-ma) she spied the van-to-pick-up-Shidara-in-of-her-dreams a little off in the distance, and managed to talk the guy into swapping out the old van he'd assigned us for brand new one..., so new there was still plastic covering the carpets..., and clean and white to match the Rav4. We made a very well put-together caravan.

It's about 28 miles from LAX to our hotel, and that can take anywhere from 35 min to a couple of hours, depending on the traffic. I stayed at the hotel and kept working on details while Megan and Kristy went to the airport. By the time they returned it was lunchtime in Japan, so they stopped to eat at Wendy's (see Kristy-cam image above)

They pulled into the hotel entry around 3pm or so, bringing me a kid's burger. There were quick greetings, a few hugs (which are not typical for them, but they learned really fast on the last tour that we hug all the time over on this side of Pacific. Kristy and I took the car back to LAX and got stuck in traffic as we exited 105. We were texting (me from the Rav4 and her from the van) as we sat there, not moving, "crap. I need gas," "me 2," "must fill b4 return car," "im almost mt" "crap. if no gas, will return car. gas less $ than late fee," (we were pushing past the 24hr rental period at that point) "my light just hit mt," "crap... did we pass hertz?" "dn't knw," "crap." Then I saw a gas station ahead on the left, "crap." and got over one lane of four. Kristy got the van over too. Then I saw a gas station to the right "crap." (which I now have programmed as a text message template), and changed back into the right lane. From there it was easy sailing, though. We both gassed up, pulled u-turns (which was strangely easy to accomplish) and dropped the rental car off late, but were not charged.

When we got back to the hotel about 40 minutes later, I did an hour-long soak in the poolside hot tub while the company and other staff went to a grocery store to pick up dinner and breakfast. This is one of our strategies for keeping within budget. Everybody picks what they want--sandwiches, salads, yogurt, bagels, juice, etc--throws it all in one cart, and then Mana-san pays with the company card. It's much less expensive than eating out, and everyone can get what they need to stay healthy.

I took a short nap, sweating off the soak and clearing my lungs a bit. Then it was back to work, with a meeting on the finances between the Japanese and U.S. staff in the lobby, and then a U.S. staff meeting as we ate our dinners in the room. A few more emails about loading times, workshop details, interviews, verifying shipments, and then I was ready to get to bed.

The phone rang in our room. It was Fumiyo (Japanese lighting tech who studies in the U.S.). The sink had clogged, or the toilet, or something. I called the front desk for a repairman, and then went to meet him at the girls' room, because my job is to make things as easy as possible for them. And think about it: If you were in Japan, and didn't speak Japanese, and your hotel room sink were stopped up, and no one there spoke English, what would you do? Not that this is the case now, because Fumiyo speaks English wonderfully, but still, it's my job to keep them from feeling uncomfortable, and a big repairman in their room this late at night (11pm) might be uncomfortable for them.

Okay, so here's where I get to the best part of my day: I had analyzed the problem was that the sink stopper control had become disconnected from the stopper, so the repairman was only there for about 5 minutes. And since Fumiyo was there, I got to say (and have her translate for Aya) how happy I was to see her again. We exchanged a few similar phrases with Fumiyo's help, and then Aya lifted up the front of her sweatshirt so I could see what she was wearing..., and it was the Odaiko Sonora t-shirt we'd given her two years ago. And if that's not a good best-part-of-my-day, I don't know what is!