Oops...

...I definitely dropped off the face of the earth there for almost 2 weeks. I've gotten so many questions about my time in Nashville from those who aren't lucky (or misfortunate?) enough to have to hear my ramblings in person. My bad. I apologize. But does it make it even a little better if I say that I pretty much had the best last 2 weeks ever? I hope so, because I did! It all seems a little bit of a blur to me, but in the best way possible. I'm sort of floating along at this point.

So, for Nashville...what can I say? It was my 13th conference with my company (please refrain from inserting old-age jokes), and I have to say it was my best/favorite ever. It was just the perfect mix of excitement, hilarity, learning (we squeezed a little in there), revelry, mishaps, a little flirty love (I mean, it's us...that can never be avoided, let's be honest)...everything that makes a great company conference. I, of course, failed to take many pictures - I got a few, but haven't even uploaded them yet...I'll share when I do - but in place of photo evidence of all the shenanigans, here are the highlights:

1. Drinking and "working" all afternoon on Tuesday with some of my besties (we DID get some work done...it just took us longer than it should have)
2. Fried pickles
3. Balloon guy at social event - his two best creations? A birthday cake balloon hat (for my girl, ES!), and two pink balloon jock strap/drink holders...the wearers will remain nameless (unless you were there...then you know who I'm talking about)
4. #2 best quote of the conference - "Please excuse my aging disease."
5. By far the #1 quote - "Um...did you just motor-boat your martini?!"
6. Doing a flash mob dance (cupid's shuffle to a Hall & Oates song) DURING the company meeting on Thursday afternoon...priceless. (I was, proudly, one of the first 10 people to kick it off)
7. Me singing a solo and duet, while leaning on a grand piano, in front of all 800 of my coworkers. (Nailed it!)
8. Trying to play cherades for the word "popsicle" (seriously...try it)
9. Burger Up!
10. Walking through the giant hotel barefoot at 3:00am (including through the rocks in the jungle atrium)...and then wondering 4 hours later why my feet were all scraped up...
11. Party whistles! (AK and I rocked them all night on Thursday...and I'm pretty sure every other person was insanely jealous)
12. Doing the 'running man' dance in yellow stilettos in front of coworkers (and then tripping...but luckily out of most people's view)
13. My order of training materials copies being lost...and as a result, me spending 3 hours at the hotel Fedex-Kinko's on Wednesday morning (babysitting their staff to make sure my stuff got done!)
14. Drinking the dance club bar entirely out of Ketel One...and being oh-so-proud of it...but also a little peeved that they didn't have more
15. Company cocktail hour on the hotel lawns, that looked exactly like a wedding reception. So other guests kept asking who the happy couple was...eventually one of my friends and I just said it was us.
16. Texting my 'honey bun' during the meetings...even though he was sitting approximately 10 inches away from me (it was for the best...no one else really needed to be in on that!)
17. Being totally fine running on 2 - 2.5 hours of sleep per night (seems so crazy, but we always make it happen!)

Every single time I leave one of these conferences, I just know that I have another big set of memories that I will remember for the rest of my life. And from this one in Nashville? Probably...no DEFINITELY, the biggest and best set (so far...). Yee-haw! What an amazing time.