I've arrived in Toronto for the Smalltalk Solutions 2007 conference. It wasn't quite the way I planned to arrive, though. It's about a 5 hour drive from my home to Toronto, so I figured I could make it by car and return on Wednesday night. It was a good plan. Plans change.

As it turns out, my grandmother was in failing health at 88 years old. She passed away on Wednesday night and the funeral was set for Saturday in Moncton, New Brunswick. At first, my wife and I thought that we wouldn't be able to get down for the funeral. I was giving a Smalltalk course that week and it was a 13 hour drive to Moncton. Last minute flights for the two of us to get to Moncton were just too expensive.

My daughter, however, offered to watch hew two younger brothers and we made a snap decision on Friday night to drive to Moncton.

We left Ottawa around 7:00pm on Friday night stopping occasionally for short power snoozes as we needed them. We arrived in Moncton around 10:30 the next morning. We attended the funeral, met with the family, then headed back. We decided to book a hotel room in Edmundston NB to get about 4 hours of sleep before continuing (at 3:00am) on the road back to Ottawa. I was the only one who could drive since my wife's Multiple Sclerosis prevents her from driving.

On the way back, it was clear that we were taking more power snoozes to ward off drowsiness and I decided that it would be crazy for me to drive to Toronto after being on the road for 8 hours straight with only 4 hours sleep the night before. I decided to book a flight on WestJet to Toronto. That way, no matter how tired I was, I could get there safely.

I'm in the hotel now and I'm looking forward to actually getting a good night's sleep. I'm really looking forward to meeting everyone at the conference. See you there.