Allright, here is the short version of the trip:

Saturday - depart PHL

Sunday - Arrive LHR, take train to Paddington. Taxi to hotel. Discover that headboard shares wall with elevator shaft. Request move to new room. Move to new room. Discover that new room has no heat. Ask for heat. Dinner with clients. Return to hotel. Still no heat. Give up and pile blankets on bed.

Monday - Enjoy breakfast at hotel with clients. Do not enjoy cost - £20.00 which converts to about $40.00. Per person. Ouch. Play at reinsurance all day. Return to hotel. Still no heat. Dinner with clients. Return to hotel. Note the additional phone charges at hotel - £3.00 per local or credit card call plus £3.00 per fifteen minutes. Converts to $12.00 everytime phone is picked up. Ouch again.

Tuesday - Breakfast again. Still expensive. More reinsurance. Return to hotel. Marvel at British show that re-enacts the Michael Jackson trial. Dinner with clients. Return to hotel. Phone calls are still expensive. Still no heat.

Wednesday - Pack. Venture out to local Starbucks and enjoy cup of coffee for £2.10 rather than £20.00 breakfast. Feel better about world. Return to hotel. Discover that flight to JFK is cancelled. Spend hour and a half on phone with Virgin. Determine that we cannot make connection to Bermuda tonight so postpone rest of trip to following week. Take clients to lunch at Harrod's. Car service to airport. Spend 45 minutes in line at VAT booth so client can get VAT refund. Fly to JFK. Arrive at 8:45 p.m. Wait 30 minutes for client to get through passport control. Find car service. Arrive in Philly at 11:30 p.m. Discover red rose on doorstep. Find path of red roses leading up to house, bouquet of flowers and homemade crab cakes waiting for me. Plus happy boyfriend and cat.

Spend much of yesterday rescheduling Bermuda part of trip for next week.

[So we can do it all again.]

I finally understand why it is so hard for me to assemble IKEA furniture. It's because they don't show enough women assembling the BJÖRKENS, TROFASTS and SPÄNSTIGS:

According to Norway's prime minister, Kjell Magne Bondevik, the Swedish furniture giant is guilty of stereotyping because only men are shown assembling furniture in its instruction booklets.

"This isn't good enough," the prime minister told the Oslo daily Verdens Gang.

He claimed to be unimpressed by the company's argument that it did not want to offend Muslims by depicting women building beds, sofas and those ubiquitous bookcases.

"It's important to promote attitudes for sexual equality, not least in Muslim nations," he said.

"They should change this. There's no justification for it."

R-i-i-i-ght. Because the blobby Ikea figure is not wearing a skirt, I just assume that I can't do it myself.

Of course, even if the blobby Ikea figure was wearing a skirt, I still couldn't do it, because I normally don't wear skirts while assembling furniture.

[Now all they need is a lawsuit about it.]

Quote du jour:

". . . while men represent powerful activity as assertion and aggression, women in contrast portray acts of nurturance as acts of strength."

-- Carol Gilligan

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