I'm Still Here...

I know, I know...I've been delinquent in my blogging duties. It's partially due to the fact that I still haven't replaced my laptop (yeah I'm working on it - this month is the goal), partially due to the fact that a lot has been going on, and partially due to sheer laziness. So here goes my recap of the past few weeks.
I went home last weekend to dance as part of Family and Friends Day at my church on that Sunday. As of the weekend before, I hadn't even decided on a song, so you can pretty much imagine how my week went. I picked out a song ("That Name" by Yolanda Adams) and choreographed the dance all in a few hours (pressure does produce miracles, lol). Then I had asked my sister to dance with me (in the spirit of Family and Friends day) so when I got home last weekend, I spent a good part of Saturday teaching her the dance, then we went down to the church and rehearsed there. I apologize that I didn't get to see anyone last weekend - I was in and out. I spent the rest of Saturday with my family - my brother and I took my mom out to Jersey to pick up her computer, then the rest of the evening we just had "Family Fun night". I made smoothies. And I was supposed to bake cookies with my sister but the recipe called for melted butter and ours was in the big freezer so that sucker was not melting anytime in the near future. I spent all day Sunday at church, and my cousin surprised me by sending my godson to come see me dance, which made me very happy. My godson is a sweetheart but he is a little man (he just turned 5). He proceeded to tell me exactly what he thought of my dance (he liked it) and our outfits (he liked those too - they were "beautiful" according to him, lol). After church, I had to head straight to the airport and that was the beginning of my adventure of trying to get home.
In a nutshell, I flew Delta airlines from JFK, and they had not given me a seat assignment when I booked my ticket, so when I got to JFK and tried to check in at the kiosk, it would only print me an itinerary, not a boarding pass. Then when I went to check my bag, the agent wouldn't accept my bag b/c I didn't have a boarding pass. When I tried to explain that I didn't have a boarding pass b/c I didn't have a seat assignment, she told me she couldn't help me. Long story short, I eventually found another agent who didn't believe that the kiosk wouldn't print me a boarding pass until I literally walked him over to the kiosk and walked him through the process (for the 3rd time). He eventually got me to an agent who was able to check in my bag and print me something that stated I was confirmed on a flight which would get me through security. At the gate, it was a whole other adventure. There were about ten flights leaving from this one gate in the span of two hours. When I arrived they were boarding a flight to Toronto and there were several people without seats. A woman and her 8 year old daughter were there in tears and she was screaming at the agents saying that this was only her second flight with Delta and that this was the second time they were telling her they didn't have a seat for her. Eventually they found 2 seats on the flight and the man that was with the woman and child (not sure if it was her husband or not) told them to take the two seats and he would rebook himself on a different flight. It was pure madness. The agent told me he couldn't give me a seat until my flight started boarding 30 minutes before the departure time. So I made sure I was the first one on the line the minute he opened up access to the gate. It turned out ok for me - he scanned my confirmation document and it printed out a little ticket with a seat assignment on it. However, I still made up my mind not to fly Delta anymore if I can help it. Somehow I think if I were going someplace a little more popular than Minneapolis it could have been a problem.
So that was my weekend. Back in Minneapolis, it's been busy. Most days I have a happy hour, or dinner, or some other social event to go to. This week, I was doing a lot of recruiting activities. We had some folks who are in MLT (the pre-MBA program I was in before Wharton) visit this week, so I went to an event to meet them since I seem to be the only MLT alum at the company. I was also helping with the National Black MBA office visits yesterday. Last week, Jjais (my Andover friend who's in law school here) and I had gone out to dinner in Uptown and on our way back to our car, this guy stopped us asking if we knew of any parties going on b/c his friends were in town from Atlanta (in retrospect, he was just trying to get our attention b/c it turns out he's a promoter so I'm sure he knew if there were parties going on). Anyway, he gave us his card, and Jjais emailed him early in the week introducing us, and he responded almost immediately with 50 million emails about things going on in the city, and introducing us to people he knew so they could add us on their event email lists. It was a nice gesture. So this past Thursday, we decided to go to the Urban League Young Professionals mixer. I saw some familiar faces from the meeting but there were a lot more folk there than I expected. It was nice. We met a girl who is even newer to Minneapolis than me (she's been here a month, and moved from Milwaukee) and she's a Clinic director out in the suburbs and doesn't know very many people here either, so we're going to try to invite her when we go out. We also met
a lady who directs a youth AIDS center in the city and she said she was going to invite us to some events also. It was a cool event. It was held at NBA City, which is like a sports bar, right next to the Target center so they had big screen televisions. Jjais and I were the last ones there - we stayed and watched the vice presidential debates then headed out. Jjais goes out even less than me so I told her we have to commit to weekly events to make sure we don't become hermits.
This weekend is going to be about getting my apartment in order and finding some red and khaki outfits. I have my store experience at the beginning of the week, where I go and work in one of the stores for a few days and we have to wear red and khaki which I don't have in my closet. I went and bought a long sleeve button down company branded shirt yesterday but I still need a few more shirts as well as some khakis. So I will be shopping and trying to find a dresser (I still don't have one) and maybe a sofa (I have a feeling I might order that online). I'm doing laundry at the moment but I'll be heading out in a bit. I promise it won't be another two weeks before I write again. One love y'all.