more travel....

I've been doing a lot more travelling lately. At the end of November, I had to go to Dallas for several days for the Summit my work was sponsoring. The weather turned bad as we had an ice storm also with a bit of snow. It wasn't too bad. I left for Dallas on Thanksgiving day and ended up sitting in traffic for a while. What normally would be a three-hour drive ended up taking six hours.

In December I had to head back to Dallas for our new teen council meeting. While here I was able to do some Christmas shopping for the kids and also go to grab a burger at "Keller's Drive-In". It was on the GQ/Gayle King list of 20 best burgers although it wasn't all that special to me. It was a total dive and no telling how they found that place.

At the end of January, I had to go to Santa Monica for the second of our Summit.

I am always on the lookout for celebrities. On the flight up, Minka Kelly, the cheerleader from "Friday Night Lights" was on my flight. She was also on my flight back to Texas. Other than that, I didn't see any celebrities. We were scheduled to catch the last taping for the season of the "George Lopez Show" but ended up getting stuck in LA traffic and missed the taping by a couple of hours. I also went to eat at "The Ivy" but alas no celebrities there either.

There was time to grab a burger from "The Counter" which was on the list of 20 best burgers from GQ/Gayle King. It was pretty good as were the fries/onion strings. We also ate at Mel's Diner (not on the list but a cute place) where I was able to get car boxes for the kids -- they are sort of like happy meal boxes in the shape of cars. The bartender there made us drinks called "PD" which stands for panty droppers. The drink was so good but I have since lost the recipe he wrote down for me. I'll just have to head back there on my next trip. It was a couple of blocks from Grauman's Chinese Theatre. Another great place we ate at was "Fords Filling Station" -- a restaurant owned by Harrison Ford's son, Ben. I had a rib-eye there and it was the best I have ever had.

February took me to DC and NYC. We went to DC for the launch of new helpline. It was a quick trip and we got a sprinkling of snow while there.

In the middle of February, I went to NY for our advisory board meeting. That too was a quick trip but I did have time for purse shopping. There weren't any that really caught my fancy but I bought one anyway just because I hadn't bought one in my last couple of trips there. While I was out purse shopping with a colleague, we were standing at the light talking and I looked at the person standing next to her and it was the acress, Leelee Sobieski,

** I've also been able to get a burger (also on the GQ/Gayle King list) at Burger Joint in the Le Parker Meridian in NYC. That was a GREAT burger. The place is a total dive that is so out of place in that swanky hotel but it was a super treat.