heading to portlandia

solo travel is such a novelty for me.  it's such a rare occurrence, and i always find myself rather conflicted on whether it's the best thing ever or a huge bummer that i don't have anyone to share it with.  this time, it was a quickie trip to portland for the disney social media moms "on the road" conference.

the hub had given the old lady the choice between taking her sister to gymnastics and driving me to the airport.  i was stoked that she chose the latter, until i remembered that she hates the bean's gym because the place smells like the inside of a stinky, sweaty pair of running shoes.  heh.  in any case, she happily dropped me off at ONT, grabbed my suitcase out of the trunk, and gave me a hug as i headed off into the terminal.

getting through security was easy breezy, and i had a full hour to kill.  so what did i do?  well, duh - airport bathroom selfie!

hello, mr. pilot.  please get us to our destination safely.

i'd chosen an actual book as my reading material:

bye, ontario!  i think.  i can never really tell where we are from high above.

it wasn't very long before we made our descent and landed in san francisco.

the first thing i saw when i emerged from the plane was the giant food court.  i contemplated picking up some food, but didn't really see anything that sounded good.  and as i looked around, the signs directing me to my gate for my connecting flight were super confusing.  to my right, gates 70-79.  to the left, 80-89.  my gate?  91.  where the hell was gate 91?  as i walked around a little more and inspected the signs a bit more closely, i finally figured it out - for some reason, my gate was lumped in with the international travelers.  how odd.

the international terminal was decidedly nicer and swankier than the domestics.  as soon as i stepped in there, i found luxury shops galore:

with just enough time to grab something to eat, i stopped for some sushi.

at my gate, i found these funny little cubby things where i happily plugged in my phone to recharge as i ate.

like my bag for the trip?  it's a souvenir from our disneyland paris vacay.

it was an uneventful flight, as we all prefer them to be, and as we landed i checked the weather.  and of course, portland was experiencing a heat wave.  yuck.

i used my uber app to request a driver, and he arrived within minutes.  it was my first time uber-ing, and i was pleasantly surprised at how easy and efficient the process was.  as i chatted with my driver, who reminded me a LOT of my stepdad, we exchanged pleasantries and basic information.  i somehow got onto the subject of the bean's biggest dream in life - to be a disney animator.  and he lit up like a christmas tree and offered to introduce us to one of his childhood friends - a guy who was the youngest fellow to go through the disney program back in the day and worked on projects like "the brave little toaster."  when i googled him later, i found out that this friend is pretty darn legit.  i've already got an email in to my new uber friend to see if we can get that hooked up.  heh.

i checked into the doubletree, where the conference was being held, and made my way up to my room.

it'd been a long few hours, and travel is always exhausting to me, so i happily dropped my bags and flopped onto the bed.

when i turned on the tv, i found myself hanging out with some friends.

and then i dug into the warm, delicious treat that i'd been given at the front desk.

good night, portland!