Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day everyone.  Today I am wearing pink and looking forward to a meal cooked by AG followed by a late Volleyball game.  It's so kind of AG to not mind my skipping out on him after dinner to play.

What's on the agenda for your Valentine's Day?

Everyone look up

If you would please take a moment to look up... no, no, not that high, just to the top of your screen.

You will notice that this blog is now hosted at www.shariously.com!

Isn't exciting?  Well maybe not for you, but certainly is for me. Now all you have to remember is "Shariously" without having to remember if it's blogspot or wordpress; easy peasy.  It also gives me more freedom in the future for doing anything I want with the webpage.

And for some entertainment on this Monday - I give you a mash up of a 2 dogs, Lincoln and some sort of stuffed pig singing Alicia Keys' "This Girl is on Fire."  What the what you may ask?  Yes, you just have to watch and see what I do when snowed in.

Sharioulsy come back soon to the new shorter url!

Travel Show (Weekend Activities)

Over the last 5 years it has become a tradition of me and AG to attend Travel shows and conventions.  When I first started working, I was on a renovation project for the Javits Center.  Since I had never attended an event there, I kept an eye out for a show that was of interest and open to the public (a lot of the shows are trade only).  I finally decided the NY Times Travel Show would be a great show to see.

The first year AG and I went it was great!  We got tons of free stuff; the best being a clear zip up pouch with a variety of less than 4oz bottles to put in your carry on that I still use.  There was food and drink to sample and great deals if you were really ready to book on the spot.  AG loves to try to win free stuff, and almost every booth has a "chance to win" something.  On top of that, they had a huge line up of speakers and meet-and-greets.  The first few years we went it was also sponsored by the Travel Channel, so there was a chance to meet Andrew Zimmern and we got to see Samantha Brown give a talk (I even got to ask her a question). She was definitely a highlight since senior year of college, my roommates and I would eat lunch in front of Passport to Europe practically every day! Another year I took the Jeopardy test, and the Clues Team presented before hand.

Over the years, AG and I have been more times than we can count to either the NY Times Travel show or the Travel & Adventure show (both are pretty similar).  We have gotten to know the ins and outs of these shows; which vendors to avoid, which booths are scams and what to free giveaways are really ones that you won't throw out once you get home.

We've started to notice the show going down-hill.  We were really excited this year to find out about potential deals with an upcoming European trip and honeymoon in the works, but the show just didn't live up to the expectations.  The speakers have become less well-known, there are fewer booths and less giveaways.  The best scores of the day were a passport holder and pretty nice AMEX hemp tote.

We weren't impressed with this year's show, we might Shariously have to consider a new convention tradition.  What conventions do you like attending?