Thoughts From Travelworld

Burt Likko

Pseudonymous Portlander. Pursuer of happiness. Bon vivant. Homebrewer. Atheist. Recovering Republican. Recovering Catholic. Recovering divorcé. Editor-in-Chief Emeritus of Ordinary Times. Relapsed Lawyer, admitted to practice law (under his real name) in California and Oregon. There's a Twitter account at @burtlikko, but not used for posting on the general feed anymore. House Likko's Words: Scite Verum. Colite Iusticia. Vivere Con Gaudium.

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20 Responses

  1. Tod Kelly says:

    Best. Post. Picture. EVER.Report

  2. Mike Schilling says:

    I feel you, man.  Over the past year, I’ve been to Buenos Aires (twice) [1], New York, Atlanta, Chicago, San Diego, Denver, and Bloomington(IL).  Some good times, but never better than home.

    In all my years of business travel I was once, back when I was single, seated next to a genuinely beautiful woman.  I said “Hi”, and she smiled dazzlingly, and said “Hi” back, with a slight and utterly adorable accent.  I asked where she was from and she said “Brazil.  That’s where my parents moved when the Jews threw them out of Palestine.”

    1. The first time during the World Series, the second during the Super Bowl.Report

  3. karl says:

    Yeah, that photo; was it taken on ‘casual Friday’?Report

  4. Because ours is a universe of caprice and perversity, I have quite often sat next to gorgeous women on planes.  (One of them was a Rockette.  She was the most fun to talk to.)  My apologies to those gentlemen who may, perhaps, have appreciated the experience in ways that I did not.

    And you are dead right about the quality of cocktails made in Travelword as compared to those I can make myself.  I have stopped ordering them when I travel, because so often they’re just a chilled glass of disappointment.Report

  5. Mike Dwyer says:

    Great post Burt. I just started traveling for work last December. It’s infrequent so I still kind of enjoy it. I completely understand missing your wife in bed. I sleep terribly in hotel rooms without her. My wife seems to find this endearing.Report

  6. Will H. says:

    I travel a lot, and I wish I didn’t.
    I worked in only two states last year. Five the year before that.
    About two or three times a year, I wake up in my own bed wondering what city I’m in. I don’t always get it right.
    I’ve learned that I’m always going to forget something while I’m packing, so I’ve established habits to minimize that.
    It really irritates me when people say that it’s fun, exciting, or adventurous to travel.
    If I’m going to McPherson, Ks., to spend 12 hours a day at a refinery seven days a week, that’s not fun.
    I have yet to see busloads of Japanese tourists at any of the places they send me.

    I need coffee.Report

  7. J_A says:

    For what is worth, I travel about 50% of my time, and I still like it. Whenever I am home for like 3 weeks I miss the excitement of the plane, of getting to see different places (even if I have been there ten times already), of having different food, of taking hundreds of pics (not a metaphor, literally 100s) with my phone, of squeezing the odd extra day here and there to explore.

    I applied to my second job, in 1986, because they ran an add in the paper that asked for an electrical power engineer, and that heavy travel would be involved. I never regretted it (25 years and going). I hope I never loose the wonder of it. Probably the coolest trip (at least to describe in cocktail parties) i’ve had was Houston to Shaghai to London to Buenos aires to Lima and back to Houston. Two weeks altogether

    I find the possibility of doing in hours what it might have taken months not 100 years ago to be amazing and exhilarating. I guess I am a 49 yeras old child. .It’s a big planet and I want to have as much as possible of it

    And refineries are cool places. I don’t go to many, but when I do, I also take pics galore with my phone. I am based inHhouston and I take visitors to see the refineries at night from the highway. Boy, do I need a life

     Report

  8. Kimmi says:

    1) If you’re ever in Pittsburgh, stay at Google’s personal hotel. You’ll know the one I mean… Hot breakfast includes a waffle iron, plug in station for your car… It’s really decent.

    2) Real executives have travel clothes — Ex Officio sells a damn nice set. (Just like real southerners wear Seersucker — it’s designed for the humidity) — they’re hard to wrinkle, and dry like a breeze (literally, if you’re in Vegas. Walk outside dripping, be dry in a few seconds). It’s kinda fun to dress like an exec sometimes — the whole “exec is on vacation, but can’t quite figure out how to dress casual” is kinda cool — less so when people start taking pictures of you, mistaking you for a rock star.

    3) Real business hotels have clotheslines in them (Stayed at a hotel in NY like that)Report

  9. Patrick Cahalan says:

    I used to travel for work, all conferences.

    Traveling for conferences isn’t like other work travel.  They either start on a Monday, or end on a Friday, so you can always plug in the two extra days to see the sights.  At one point Kitty had to go to Noosa, Australia for a conference and we turned it into an actual vacation.

    I can imagine, however, that constant travel to places you’ve already been and don’t have the time to go see anyway weighs heavily in the suck department, though, for all reasons described herein.  Great post, Burt.Report

  10. Plinko says:

    Getting ready to head out myself for my twice-yearly overseas trip. This time to include 2.5 glorious days in Bangladesh. I’ve learned to cope with traveling, and I still do enjoy getting far away to see different places and eat different foods, even if I am working 14 hour days for most of it.Report

  11. Damon says:

    I used to travel on business.  About every 3 months I’d fly to London and meet with the customer, meet with the Program managers, smooze with my peers, and maybe make a presentation to the customer.  This was before 9/11 and I’d only do it when i could get “econcomy plus” on United.  Since I wouldn’t pay the difference between economy and Business, and neither would my employer, this was the only option.  Frankly, I can’t handle small seat pitch and I’m reasonably tall.  That was the max of my desire to travel for work.  Anything more became an ordeal.  I can’t imagine doing it nowadays.  Occasionaly i’ve done one day trips..up and back the same day.  Those are tolerable but god, the “security theatre” is often just too much….

    Ugh…Report