When traveling alone anytime, including for business, it is so important to keep safety in mind! For those of you who travel often I hope you know most of these, but here is a quick rundown of the most important safety tips.

· Make sure the desk person does not say your room number out loud. If they do say your room number aloud, ask for a different room.
· Make sure you have a deadbolt in your room
· Use valet parking if it’s available. It may cost more but it’s much safer then wandering around a parking garage
· When you’re in your room keep your deadbolt locked at all times.
· Never put the “Please Clean My Room” sign on the door. It’s an open invitation to thieves! Call housekeeping instead.
· If you order room service make sure the person at your door is hotel staff.
· Don’t use the door sign provided for ordering breakfast. This is alerting anyone who walks by your room and looks at it that you are ordering for one.
· Make sure you have directions to your hotel. Also have their phone number and address handy. (I know this sounds obvious, but the last time I went to Salt Lake City I went to the wrong location of my hotel, and then couldn’t find the correct location and drove around lost for thirty minutes. I finally found the phone number on my iPhone and the very nice man stayed on the phone with me until I got there. I should know better than this!!)
· When you leave your hotel for the evening put the “Do Not Disturb” sign on your door. This makes it look like someone is there.
· Don’t put your home address on your luggage tags. Put your business address.
· Choose national hotel chains with indoor room entrances.
· Don’t stay in a room on the first floor whenever possible.
· Make sure there is no door connecting to another room.

For a very detailed list of safety tips check out:

http://kevincoffee.com/women_safety/travel_safety_tips_for_women.htm

There are many schools of thought about how to pack for a business trip. Some people like to have options. I think options are great! Except for that whole carrying everything you take thing.

My first business trip (four days) I took four separate outfits, a couple of “option” shirts, a large toiletry kit, four pairs of shoes…….and I could not lift my suitcase. By the time I got to San Jose I was so ready to go to my hotel and get some food. But instead I waited for my bag at baggage claim. And waited. And waited. Literally twenty minutes after the first bag came onto the carousel (and fifty minutes after I got off the plane) my bag came. I then had to drag it to the rental car bus. And those of you who have been to San Jose know that the rental cars are not close or convenient to the terminals. (This was also the first time I rented a car, but that is a whole other story.) I finally got to my hotel an hour and a half after my flight landed. To add insult to injury: I wore less than half of the clothes I brought.

Three years later, I have learned my lesson!! Don’t pack “outfits”. If you really feel like you need options, pack tops that go with all of your bottoms. That way, for example, you have a possible eight outfits with two bottoms and four tops.

My current packing list for a four day trip:
1 pair of black pants (wear on plane)
1 pair of Capri pants or a skirt
1 pair of jeans or casual pants
4 cute tops (that match with all bottoms)
Yoga pants and tank top for sleeping
Enough undergarments for every day plus one extra
Carry-on toiletries
Makeup
Curling iron
Comfy travel shoes (wear on plane)
Comfy nice shoes for work
Pashmina
Book
Knitting
Laptop

All easily carried in one small carry-on suitcase and one large purse. Lesson learned!!

Today’s post is short and sweet—go see LOVE, the Cirque du Soleil/Beatles show in Las Vegas. It is fabulous. Anyone who even halfway likes the Beatles will really enjoy it. It is all normal Cirque acrobatic dancing, even more visually beautiful than normal, to reproduced and re-imagined Beatles songs. As someone who was raised on Beatles music, I can’t tell how much this show moves me. I’ve seen it three times (!!) and can’t wait to see it again.

http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/shows/love/default.aspx

It started on the first full day of my recent vacation in Vegas, but I didn’t realize it was a pattern until the flight home.  My husband, sister, future brother in law, and I had met at a restaurant for breakfast.  When our waitress came to take our drink order, as she left she said, “Happy Fourth of July!”  My sister said thanks and asked her if she was going to be working late, or getting off work in time to celebrate.  “I’m getting off at three!!” she replied. “I love Fourth of July. I just can’t wait to get f**d up!!”  Wow.  Have fun with that.

Then there was the cab driver who told us (as he was dropping us off at Circus Circus for dinner) that he would never go there ever, and anyone who wanted to go there was crazy, because it was the worst casino on the strip.  Tactful.  And the poolside waitress who, after sharing that she liked to let her dog kiss her mouth even after the dog had been cleaning its privates, let us know that the reason she’s been in such a bad mood lately is because she really needed to get laid.  And finally, our cab driver on the drive to the airport sharing that business has been so bad that she was crying earlier that morning, and made approximately $.70 per hour the day before.  Boundaries, people!

Why do people do this?  Maybe because they know chances are very slim of ever seeing again the tourist they just dumped on,  so who cares.  Or maybe the personality type that is drawn to live in a town like Vegas is very talkative.  A desperate need to talk to someone, anyone.  Likely it’s a combination of many things that I have no idea about.  I would like to find out though!

And one thing is for sure—this experience has made me want to be more aware of any oversharing tendencies of my own.  I will definitely be more careful in the future not to share too much.  Because I’m pretty sure the guy who checks me into my hotel next week doesn’t care one way or the other about how I have the cutest, best dogs in the world, or how I got lost on the way there and started crying in the car.  Or how much I am looking forward to getting f**d up that night.

More to come from the Vegas trip……

50-year-old passenger disrobes mid-flight

Man ignored requests to get dressed, refused to be covered with blanket

(from the Associated Press, July 1 2009)

“ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico – A cross-country US Airways flight was diverted to Albuquerque after a male passenger removed his clothing mid-flight.

Dan Jiron, a spokesman for the Albuquerque airport, says 50-year-old Keith Wright of New York disrobed Tuesday while sitting in his seat in the back of the aircraft. He says Wright was unresponsive when a flight attendant asked him repeatedly to get dressed and refused to be covered with a blanket.

Jiron says law enforcement employees who were passengers on the plane helped subdue and handcuff Wright before the flight landed. The FBI says Wright is in federal custody on a charge of interfering with flight crew members and attendants.

A US Airways spokeswoman says the plane from North Carolina continued on to Los Angeles after Wright’s arrest.”

Remember friends–they aren’t kidding when they say you have to do what the flight attendants tell you to do.  Although,  it sure is a good story….