[Don Sabo]

Before I am allowed to attend the Blackbaud Conference, I must agree to send a daily message back to my co-workers. The WWMW has suggested that I post my message here for anyone to read. I hope that you enjoy them as much as my co-workers do.

Day 1 is below.
Well I do not know quite where to start with today's report. I was talking to the guy next to me on the plane from Akron, Darlene imagine me talking to a stranger on a plane, and we both noticed that it seems that they are making the planes a lot smaller then before. They are also making the seat belts a lot smaller, talk about saving money!!! On the flight from Cincinnnati, I had a girl from Michigan next to me and she told that she interviewed for a job with Blackbaud on the phone.
I am going to get to the good part, the Food, but I am having trouble remembering what I ate yesterday, because I think that I drank more wine then I ate food. Either my memory is failing or yesterday was just a blur. Some girls from the RE User Group and I are running a test to see if you get drunk faster drinking red wine vs white wine. I had the white wine. Today I will switch to the red. I had about 3 glasses from 4-6 and about another 3 from 6-8. The items that I do remember was the individual Beef Wellington, the crab cakes and the all you can eat pasta bar with a cook were excellent. Since a new president and CEO took over Blackbaud, we all noticed that it looks like Blackbaud is cutting back on their food budget. They did not have the chocolate fountain this year.
My room in the Embassy Suites is on the top floor the Presidential Suite. I have an ocean view because I know the ocean is out there somewhere.
Today's breakfast was at the hotel and it was good but nothing spectacular to report about.
Tonight we are celebrating my birthday with a reception of about 700 Blackbaud people at some auditorium in Charleston. I will let you know how that went if I have any brain cells left. Some of you might think that I had no brain cells to start with!!!
Day 2
Great news!!! Mr. Food is back in town. Mr. Wino is no more!!! Yesterday was a food day from heaven. Of course it started with a breakfast from the Embassy Suites and the lunch was something that all of you will start drooling on your keyboard when you read this. We started with fresh greens salad and moved on to the brown rice salad with raisins and nuts, then proceeded to the potato salad with a hint of mustard and spices. The main course was Chicken Picatta and then also had a flank steak. Now we get to the desserts and they had invidual round servings of different types of mouses and I chose a dark brown apple crumb cake.
The evening was topped of with my birthday party celebration with 700 of my closest Blackbaud friends. We went to some auditorium in Charleston and they had a cajun party. Before you got inside they had some type of southern punch. It started off with tables full of crawfish and boiled peanuts. You stood there and twisted off the tail and then removed the other shell parts and they just plopped it in your mouth. I do not remember how many of these little critters I ate, but it seems like they do not fill you up. The main buffet table contained something that looked like chicken a la king, but with crawfish instead. They had catfish, rice and of course gumbo. For dessert that had hot peach cobbler and chocolate bread pudding. They had a cajun band that played throughout the night. It definately was a birthday to remember.
Day 3
Day 3 was like going on a roller coaster at Cedar Point. From the high of breakfast to the low of lunch and back again to the ultimate high for supper. Breakfast at the hotel was its usual superior quality, but the lunch consisted of wrap sandwiches, potato chips and the leftover desserts from the day before. I went to Jestine's for supper, now for those of you who do not watch the Food Channel, Rachael Ray visited Charleston and ate at Jestine's. This restaurant features down home Southern cooking. I know that your mouth is starting to water, so I will get to the good food that I ate. The waitress brought out a little bowl filled with thinly sliced cucumbers. She explained that these are pickled cukes and they are extremely cooling during the heat of the summer. Surprisingly they were sweet with just a hint of vinegar, you could taste the sweet and the sour. I had corn bread along with everyone's favorite, Fried Green Tomatoes. The tomatoes were thickly sliced, dipped in a light batter and very were hot temperature wise. The main course consisted of two grilled pork chops served over a bed of white rice, with mashed potatotes that had a brown mushroom and onion gravy and finally another of your favorite: okra gumbo. Needless to say some of these items are not found north of the Mason Dixon line. Now you are not going to believe this, but I was so full that I could not finish my dinner, let alone order any homemade desserts that included pecan pie. But after walking thru the market place I had to stop at the candy store and buy some hot praline bear claws. Hopefully these will make it home, but i doubt it.
Until my next trip, Mr. Food signing off and wishing all of you Good Eats.

[Witch]

ROTF - Don, it was just as funny reading it the second time!

Next year I am following you around for the best food selections but as far as drinks . . . well you remember, martini, gin or vodka?