Work Trip to Austin

We’re driving back on the bus from RGV Day in Austin. It’s freezing in here and I have a terrible cold/allergies so it’s a little hard to sleep, what with my back to the frigid vents even with my puffy jacket on and my nose dripping every 10 seconds. Boo.

It’s my first long-distance, overnight trip with work. Before this, the furthest I’d travelled with work was to Laredo with my boss, heh.

I only slept 3 hours Monday night and had to be up and at the office by 4am to have coffee ready for our guests and fellow bus-riders. By 5am we were all on board and ready to go. 

I could feel this cold creeping up on me on our drive up to Austin. My sore throat, sinus pressure and headache slowly became really strong but I didn’t let it deter me from participating.

We were already arriving about 15 minutes late, so they directed us to our 2nd stop since there were tons of lines to get anywhere. This, of course, was the perfect opportunity to snap a few photos.

When we finally made it to the House Floor we found some seats and listened. It was pretty incredible to experinece that.

We headed to our hotel for the luncheon/Team orientation. We’d be on teams and visiting our Legislators to speak to them about our most pressing issues in the Valley and dropping off a swag bag with lots of goodies.
Those bags were heavy!  We had to lug them around as we explored the halls looking for the right floors and rooms for our Senators. We got to four of them and then headed out for a photo-op with Governor Greg Abbott and George P. Bush. I ran into Jr. there!

We finished up with the photos and gathering everyone and Jr. led us to the right hall and building. After that, we headed to the reception hall. It was a huge turnout. The girls and I munched on veggies and flourless chocolate cake. I need to look up what was in there because NOTHING that decadent and spectacular could be good for you!

I was feeling really, really bad by then. My head was pounding and I felt like my face would explode from the pressure, so I didn’t much feel like mingling. It went by fast though, so we got some of Gerry’s supplies together to store on the bus and we checked in to the hotel, around 7:30pm.

Steve was taking us to Quattro Gatti, a cute little Italian restaurant on Congress Ave. We discussed the day and had some laughs. I took a terrible photo of my tortellini with cream, mushrooms, prosciutto and peas, but let me tell you: it was incredibly delicious! The best word to describe it would be cozy and it hit the spot. My d-asti was great, too 🙂 .

We finished up and headed back to the hotel. As we’re going up we run into Jr. again, so Jorge (my co-worker) and I join him, Matt, Rick and Chris from Harlingen for a drink.

I was becoming really groggy from my cold/allergies, but Jr. got me a grapefruit drink called the Lady Bird. I was hoping the Vitamin C would help my situation, heh.

I drank it slowly throughout the hour we chilled out with them and then I excused myself to buy DayQuil, call Jorge, shower and crawl into bed. I slept pretty well until 3am, when my nose got the best of me. The rest of the night was spent tossing and turning and making walrus tusks: tissues stuffed into my nose 🙁 .

We woke up, checked out, had a great breakfast and in the time it’s taken me to write this, I’ve attempted to nap but got a crook in my neck, stopped for a bathroom break and had lunch at a taqueria in George West. Glad for this experience and ready for the next!