All right then, now that I've had about 12 hours of sleep and some coffee in me I'm ready to discuss this year's adventure in Wilmington. The weekend started out great. Lyzz and I left my house around 9ish Saturday morning and made it to the Double Tree on Route 202 in Wilmington around 10:45. We probably would have gotten there sooner if we hadn't made two stops for gas and cigarettes. Seeing as how the whole point of the weekend was to get some professional development, we went to three different sessions that afternoon. I actually enjoyed all three of mine so right there this year was better than before. My last session ended at 4 p.m. so I took some time to get a run in (go me with the will power) and chill out in the room before Lyzz got back with some beer and wine.

For dinner a group of us ventured out to the Brandywine Brewery. I say ventured out because no one had any idea how to get there. We departed from the hotel around 7 and didn't get to the brewery until close to 8 or 8:30ish. Lol, talk about going out of your way. After the first half hour of meandering around the roads of Wilmington it became a mission so to speak to find the place. Sure enough, as it turns out if we had only stayed on the first road a little bit longer we would have found it right away. Go figure. Anyway, we spent some time drinking, eating and having good conversation at the brewery for a little bit then decided to go back to the hotel to drink. It was sort of late and we did have alcohol waiting for us at the hotel. Designating Mike and Tom's room the official "party" room, a bunch of us went back, watched cheesey movies, drank and hung out. Eventually everyone started leaving the room as it was getting late and we still had some sessions to go to in the moring. Soon it was just Lyzz, Tom, Mike and myself. Lyzz and Tom decided to go to the hot tub for a little bit before it closed at midnight (it was almost 11:45 when they left) so Mike and I just hung out a little bit more until they came back. That and Lyzz had the only available key to our hotel room.

Good lord this is a long story...but again, I digress.

After Lyzz and Tom got back another friend of ours joined us in the room. Tom, Mike and I were getting tired but Lyzz and the newly arrived friend wanted to stay up. So they went back to our room and I stayed with Mike and Tom. Yes, I slept in the same bed as Mike and NO, nothing happened. The closest (that I know of) we came to making any kind of contact was when I went to roll over at one point and he was rightthere. I quickly rolled back over and went back to sleep. The next thing I knew Lyzz was beating on the door at 6 a.m. screaming about her arm being broken. Tom, Mike and I all bolted out of bed to get her into the room. We called the front desk, had an ambulance sent and sure enough, her arm was broken in two places. Snap-o. From what I could gather from her she was trying to tidy up our room, turned around, her knee gave out and down she went.

Talk about your exciting endings to the weekend.

We spent the rest of the day yesterday in Wilmington trying to get Lyzz home and comfortable. Mike and Tom were great, they went and picked her up from the hospital, got her pain reliever (ahhhh Percocet) from the pharmacy and just made sure everything was A-O.K. before they headed home too. I was so upset after the ambulance took Lyzz away I was still shaking. Good thing Mike was there to calm me down. I owe him big time.

So that's how my weekend went. Yesterday I still had to work but did end up getting my story finished. I don't think it turned out all that badly. Word about Lyzz's arm was already spreading though. I had a few people ask me 1) What really happened and 2) Why weren't you in the room? The second question is tougher than the first. There's nothing to be ashamed of but I know how the rumor mill works. Even though absolutely, postitively, nothing happened between Mike and I somehow it's going to get around that it did. Sigh.

Today I should have made some calls for another story but I was just too tired to drag myself out of bed before noon. Then I had errands to run so I just didn't get around to it. Tomorrow I should have time during the day. Tonight I have the house all to myself. Bob took his mom out to eat then to the Orioles baseball game. My plans include finishing laundry, organizing some paperwork I've been putting off and catching tonight's episodes of The Restaurant on Bravo. How exciting, huh?