I can’t believe it’s already January 19th and Christmas and New Year’s has come and gone. This year seems destined to pass as quickly as last year did if the pace of the year keeps up as has so far. I worked in Philadelphia this week on three different and large projects. It’s Thursday evening, and I’m writing this from the Concierge Lounge at the Philadelphia Airport Marriott where I’m staying tonight.
Flashback to last weekend. I flew back from San Diego on Saturday, which was a full day’s trip home. 
My flight left at 6:30am (left my hotel at 4:30am) and didn’t arrive home until 8pm due to a flight delay on my connecting flight in DFW. The good part however, was meeting Steve (DOS) at DFW airport, where he was connecting from his round-the-world trip to Singapore/Finland/England/ and Canada. 
Steve had stayed at the Hyatt DFW airport on Friday night, and got a late checkout on Saturday which worked out well as our flight to Orlando was over 3 hours late due to maintenance. This allowed me to take a nap for an hour and a half at the hotel before our flight home.
We had a good but quick weekend at home; Saturday night and Sunday, before I left for Philadelphia on Monday. We had a late dinner at Outback on Saturday night, which is always consistently good. On Sunday evening, we finally finished opening our Christmas presents to each other, as well as a couple my sister Jenni had sent us.
Yes, we still had the Christmas tree up, as well as all the inside decorations, so with a little Christmas music and the ‘fireplace’ (i.e. TV with a fireplace DVD), we had a late mid-January Christmas to ourselves.
Steve, always the shopper, had brought me a couple things from his round the world travels, including souvenirs from Harrod’s, Canada, Finland, and Singapore.
While I had not gotten him souvenirs on my busy week in San Diego, I did finally get to give him a canvas print I had made a while back from our Vietnam trip, and had placed under the tree. Here he is posing with the print and wearing the hats we bought there; I don’t know what they are called, but I called them ‘Wok’ hats. I had taken this selfie on our AMA Waterways trip in Vietnam/Cambodia where we had bought the hats. Not just two, but a dozen! And two of them we actually use for lampshades now!
As the short weekend was quickly over, I started out the week on Monday with a nonstop flight from Orlando to Philadelphia. 
I met a co-worker on arrival and we did a bit of work prep for the upcoming week over a late lunch. I stayed at three different hotels this week, with the first one being the Homewood Suites in Doylestown, PA. While I was only there one night, this Homewood was very nice and fresh, with a really nice food spread both for dinner and breakfast; much better than the average Homewood Suites.
On Wednesday and Thursday, I worked in downtown Philadelphia and stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn, next to the Convention Center. I had stayed there several years back, and the location is convenient, and surprisingly soundproof and quiet for a downtown hotel. 
As the weather was cool and drizzly I had dinner at the hotel’s 10th (top) floor restaurant and lounge with my two co-workers. After dinner I enjoyed sitting in the lounge area by the fireplace.
I did have a fun lunch today at Whalburgers. My co-worker Mark had been there previously, and this new burger-type restaurant with a bar was a nice treat. 
We had a nice sit-down lunch, noting the ceiling listing the movies Mark Wahlberg has been in. On the way out I had to take a selfie by the family portraying hanging on the wall.
While I was quite busy each day with work, and evenings meeting co-workers for dinner, it did help to make the week pass by quickly. I’ve been waiting for the weekend as Steve (DOS) and I are flying to Santa Barbara, California for a quick weekend. I’m flying home tomorrow mid-morning, and we’re then flying out tomorrow night for Santa Barbara.
So for now, I’m finally relaxing by myself and looking forward to my flight home tomorrow. I must say I’m really impressed with the Marriott Airport Hotel here; I was warmly welcomed even as a lowly Marriott Silver member, and even given access to the Concierge Lounge! While I have Hyatt and Hilton (Lifetime) status, I don’t stay at Marriott’s that often, hence my lowly Silver status of only 10 nights a year at Marriott. The checkin agent saw my Hilton Amex card and commented we need to get you to Marriott, so that might have helped! Great customer service with a smile – Thanks!
Now I’m heading downstairs for dinner, and hopefully an early night to bed. I have a long travel day tomorrow: Philadelphia to Orlando, four hour ‘layover’, and then an evening flight to Phoenix, connecting to Santa Barbara. I think we finally drive around 9:30pm PST tomorrow night.
Ok, well a quick photo from dinner now that I’m downstairs. I walked in the busy lobby level restaurant and lounge, and normally when you’re by yourself you get a crummy seat, but the hostess saw me with my laptop and gave me a private booth that could seat six, complete with a large screen TV! My waitress here couldn’t have been nicer – again I’m really impressed with this Philadelphia Airport Hotel – it truly is a service and customer oriented hotel.
So I didn’t even mention the title of this post – tomorrow is the inauguration of the 45th President of the United States – Mr. Donald Trump. Love him or hate him, he will be the next President of the US, and I wish him much success in bringing the country and world together.
So goodnight now from the city of Brotherly Love.
