Save the Milk

I just got back from an amazing (mind-blowing, earth-shattering, perspective-shifting) business conference - the Fortune Growth Conference. With notables like Ram Charan and Stephen M.R. Covey and top thought leaders of this decade, my head is spinning from the absolute wonderment of it all.

I got the thrill of my life when I was pulled up, on stage, to talk about micro-specialization as a trend. Verne Harnish, a teacher of mine from my MIT Entrepreneurial Masters days, was the Master of Ceremonies for the conference and he was so thrilled about my book (and the fact that it was his advice to write the book) that he came and grabbed me from the crowd, told me to wait on the sidelines and then called me up to the stage. I was honored, thrilled and had no idea what he would ask me!

While I was in the always lovely Las Vegas, this is how I talked to my kiddos - Facetime, courtesy of Apple. Can you believe this technology didn't exist just a few years ago? Talk about a digital disruption!

I am proud to say I've been to the strip once, for only 4 hours, for a wedding, in my entire life. Las Vegas and all it entails (gambling, overindulging, grey moral lines) has never been something I've subscribed to (of course, the Tony Hsieh Vegas on the other hand, I am all in! He was a speaker on how he's recreating Downtown Old Las Vegas and his idea of community was motivating and inspiring). However, for this trip, a group of us that were all coached by the same coach (the amazing Ron Huntington) piled into cabs to go eat at a quintessential Las Vegas restaurant, Nobu. Ron insisted on paying. I kept warning him that the prices at Nobu were ridiculously expensive (like crazy high) and he was equally certain he wanted to show his clients a large amount of gratitude and largesse.

When we got the bill, we found out the Wygu Beef was $38 per ounce. That flaming stuff? That's Wygu Beef. All of it. $38 per ounce. And we had 8 equally impressive courses with impeccable service and taste. The bill was so much money (over $4500; discretion did not permit Ron to tell us the actual total) that one of the other larger clients with half of the guests split the tab graciously.

When it was time to go home, I was so delighted. Between pumping breastmilk in airline bathrooms and at breaks in the conference, I was miserable. I developed a clogged milk duct (painful!) and my right breast had swollen to such an uneven size that I looked like an indecisive stripper. I carefully packaged 12 ounces of breastmilk in a plastic ice bucket (graciously provided, unwittingly, by room service when I lifted it from a room service cart coming back from another room where it had delivered Hagen Daaz ice cream), filled with ice, packed in a plastic bag, surrounded by another plastic bag and then, packed in a bag that had handles for easy carrying. TSA didn't even raise an eyebrow and quickly and professionaly performed a test to confirm it was breast milk. Phew.

Because of the breastmilk, I had arrived at the airport almost 3 hours ahead of my flight (I wasn't sure what would happen!) That allowed me to give up my first class seat to fly middle seat, stand by, on an earlier flight and take a bus back to Bellingham from SeaTac instead of flying back to Bellingham on a later flight. That was probably the right thing to do since the rolling fog was pretty intense so I don't even know that the flight would have landed. When Jamisen heard I was coming home early, he was pretty excited! (actual screen shot above when he got the news). It was all worth it to be home for the midnight feeding and, for pancake making with Jamisen the next morning.

Sweet boy asked me to make blueberry pancakes. He was pretty dang happy about them and ate two. He asked me to make some for Daddy and was very concerned that his Daddy have some too.

Lily was her gloriously happy self and the morning after I got home was full of joy and laughter and yes, chaos but it was happy chaos. There's no place like home.