. . . is where I spent most of the afternoon. Last night I flew out of LAX to Chicago, where I arrived at 5-something a.m. today local time. I had just enough time to grab breakfast, which consisted of my standard Starbucks order (a grande chai latte) with a big, fat, disgusting, decadent cheese Danish. (Women who pull all-nighters for a good cause deserve cheese Danishes. That's just the way it is.)

As I got to the gate, my flight from O'Hare to Reagan National was already boarding. At the time this struck me as rather lucky; what I didn't realize is that the tight time frame between flights made it possible that my suitcase didn't make the same connection I did.

Now may be the time to tell you that I planned very cleverly for this trip, realizing that in both Chicago and D.C. I'd be indoors all of the time, so there was no reason to lug a big, heavy coat around with me on two planes. After all, before I'd actually emerge into the ambient temperature of D.C., I'd be able to retrieve my coat.

This plan was much more clever in theory than in practice, a point that was driven home to me every time the wind kicked up as I stood on the elevated Metro station waiting for the train so I could get to the hotel—wearing a long-sleeve T-shirt with a cashmere sweater over it, a hat and gloves, a scarf, and the flannel shirt that serves as my jacket when I'm in Los Angeles. I found the ensemble a bit inadequate, if you want to know the truth.

Back at the hotel, I couldn't decide if I was more hungry, or more exhausted. This dilemma was solved when I was invited out to brunch by Girl on the Right and Wonder Woman. I sort of walked briskly along with them to stay warm until we found a nice bistro, where I had pasta and Merlot, figuring that this would help me take a nap when I got back to the hotel. It worked so well that I started to get sleepy right then and there, and as I recall started babbling inchoerently, asking them how the plans for Canadian World Domination were coming along. We walked to a nearby drugstore after our "early" lunch (it was late as far as my inner clock was concerned), and stopped at a local drugstore, where they could pick up some stationary supplies they needed for their next meeting—and I looked at cheap gloves in the children's sizes that fit me. They went off to their appointment from there, and as soon as I was over my acid flashback ("oh, hey—like, look at the weave of the yarn, man") I picked up some snacks and came "home."

And then I crashed out for what was supposed to be a 2- or 3-hour nap. I woke up eight hours later at 7:00 p.m. local.

My bag arrived at the front desk about an hour ago, and I went down to get it because I'm too cheap to tip people for bringing things up to my room. (Other than that, I'm a nice person.)

And now I need to sleep enough tonight that I can get up early for the first day of Conservative Political Action Conference, which includes the ill-named "Presidential Banquet." (It's actually a Vice-Presidential Banquet, since Cheney will be there and G.W. will not, but I'm off-duty as an editor, here, so I'll let that one go.)

Please note that CPAC will pool all our blogging, and we'll also be posting to our own sites. Make sure that, in addition to the wall-to-wall Cotillion coverage, you check out Scott Schmidt's posts at Spot On.

Posted by: Attila Girl at 07:43 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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