Boulder is Beautiful, But Moreso When My Friends Show Up!
June 20, 2008
Last night I was lucky enough to get a ‘hallpass’ from GeekDaddy who readily agreed to handle Buttercup on a solo basis while I drove my happy butt up to Boulder during rush hour.
The trip was relatively uneventful – except for the usual gridlock on I-270 that could be written off to a stalled semi last night. Which of course put me in to Boulder 20 minutes later than I planned. Luckily for me, the wonderful Erin Kotecki Vest (@QueenofSpain) who I was picking up for a working dinner was also running late!
I arrived at her hotel room to be whisked into a quick hug followed by a 20 minute session of the two of us attempting several solutions to resolve an issue caused by a gorgeous blouse that happened to have cleavage down to her belt. The solution I had proposed prior to Erin’s trip turned out to be a torture device that did nothing to lift, support, or shape and are not something I recommend you repeatedly remove and reapply to an area as sensitive as the one they are designed to be applied to.
After discovering that even with two of us alternately lifting, seperating, taping, retaping ad nauseum we weren’t ever going to be able to make this work, we moved on to new options. The safety pin acquired from the Hotel’s sewing kit was not sufficient on its own, no matter how positioned. In the end, we conceded and I just sewed her into the blouse attaching it to her bra… which amazingly withstood the entire night’s activities and only made us 30 minutes late for dinner.
Fortunately, we were dining with an amazingly understanding group of people who appreciated the efforts fully. We sat down to some of the best tapas I’ve ever had at the Med which I followed up with a caesar salad and a slice of the Speziata Pizza (Extra virgin olive oil, roasted garlic, grilled chicken, sautéed jalapeños, chili flakes, cilantro, fontina & avocado) that was simply to-die-for. The only thing that outdid the food was the company at the table. Which is all I can tell you without having to kill you, because it was a ‘working’ dinner as I mentioned…
Afterwords, we attempted to move to the Rio to meet up with more folks from Twitter, only to discover that they weren’t really that interested in having our business, so at the suggestion of the wise Micah Baldwin (@micah) we relocated to the rooftop of the Lazy Dog on Pearl St. and twittered it to everyone and sundry.
Not surprisingly, there were many folks in the Denver/Boulder and surrounding areas who wanted to meet both Erin (@QueenofSpain) and Aaron Brazell (@technosailor) who were both in town to meet with Lijit. I know there’s no way I could ever list them all, (or remember them all for that matter because there were folks there I never got a chance to talk to,) but here’s a partial list of some of the amazing folks I got to spend time with last night:
@QueenofSpain, @technosailor, @zsazsa, @DaveTaylor, @micah, @tarable (and her way cool BF Adam), @Penguin, @AnnePMitchell, @DaveWebb, @MotherGooseMous, @Greeblemonkey, and @KristieMcNealy with her adorable son who stole the show… along with more than a dozen others I am of course spacing out right now!
All in all, I had a marvelous time with some incredible people – but I also realized something about Social Media that I consciously ‘knew’ but didn’t really understand until last night. Social Media has allowed me to really connect with some of the most amazing folks on levels I haven’t on the internet until now. I’ve met tons of people on the internet – and some I’ve known for years – but in the past, meeting them still held a certain amount of trepidation. But last night was just like moving friends into realspace. I didn’t feel like I was getting to know people, just finally getting to hug them in person.
