I attended one of those fun industry conferences complete with vendors, speakers, break away groups, you get the idea. The conference actually was very productive. I learned a lot. Everyone was nice. It's good to be able to network and meet so many people in our industry looking to improve and change things that I never foresaw when I first got into insurance. I hope I can take what I learned with me in my future endeavors.
I didn't have time to do much of anything in town. We were away from the heart of the Chicago that everyone sees on television. We were in Lombard. I boarded the plane early Thursday morning, arrived at the airport, was shuttled to the hotel, and registered and started meetings immediately. Even if I had the time, there was no way I had the energy to do anything but go to my room and collapse onto a very comfortable bed and watch basketball. I was able to find time to check out the Target next door, always a popular Chicago destination...Friday morning, meetings and breakfast began at 7:30 and ran through 1:30. After lunch, we were all shuttled back to the airport to try to find and earlier flight (wasn't any), and wait for our 4:12 flight back to Richmond. Once back into town, I crawled home to fall into my recliner not to move the rest of that evening. Even today I'm still feeling effects of losing one whole hour.
I know, I'm a wimp, but I had fun, and I know that Chicago will always represent how wonderful bad times can be. The bad times not only help me appreciate the good life that I have today, it reminds me that if not for those bad times, I would not be where I am today...enjoying every minute of the good times. You know what I mean. That's one thing in life we all share. Making good out of just about anything.
