Thursday, January 06, 2011

Planes, Trains and Automobiles

...or in my case- car, skyway, on foot, light rail, tram, plane, bus, van!

Today I left the bitter cold and snow of Minneapolis for sunny, warm Dallas, TX! Once a year, all the directors of all the summer missions projects in the whole US campus ministry get together for training (appropriately called Summer Project Directors Training - SPDT, since CCC likes acronyms so much).

Most of the people here are leading a summer project, or handling all of the operations for each project. Technically, I'm doing neither; I'll be coordinating the international summer projects for the midwest, specifically in terms of operations. Basically I'll be coaching the project leaders and operations people. Tomorrow all the operations people like me will gather for training, and then all the directors will arrive Friday and Saturday. I'm excited to finally see how the pieces fit together concerning summer project!

I had to laugh to myself as the plane was landing at DFW...I had quite the journey! It started off at 1030am, as I left my apartment in my car. 30 minutes and 5 miles later, (which is normal commute time) I was downtown Minneapolis, where I was able to park my car in a remote airport parking ramp for only $20 for 5 days. Unheard of! (Parking at the airport has to be at least $75 for 5 days. Since it's winter I couldn't leave my car in my apartment parking lot or on the street, as I'd get towed if they needed to remove snow).

I walked a block or two in the skyway from the ramp, heaved my huge suitcase down 3 flights in a sketchy cement stairwell, and hightailed it another two blocks outside to the lightrail station. I just missed the train so I had to wait about 8 minutes for the next one in 10 degree weather. Of course, I didn't wear my winter coat or boots because I was heading to Dallas where I wouldn't need them. But I survived :)

After a 30 minute ride on the light rail, I took a 1 minute tram ride at the airport to get to my gate. No full body scan or pat down for me, (though I am quite intrigued by the scanners).

The non-stop flight to Dallas was cheap (traveling Thursday-Tuesday is so nice!) and uneventful. From the baggage claim at DFW, I hopped on a 15 minute bus ride to the other side of the airport to catch my free van to the hotel downtown.

Door-to-door, the trip took 8.5 hours...a full days' work! No wonder I'm ready for bed at 930pm. Looking forward to posting more about the conference once it gets up and running. Pray I'll be able to retain all the information that will be thrown at me in the next 4 days! :)

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