At which point I sat in a corner and cried...

I am back from Alaska...for almost a week, actually... It is quite the shocker that I actually made it back.

I am being melodramatic.

Back track. To the Thursday I was up in Alaska. Everyone was in town at this point... all of the audit team, Tim, etc. I spent the day trying to solve a $2M problem that turned out to be insolvable. By the end of the 12 hours that day I'm pretty sure that everyone wanted to kill each other...there were two of us who had worked on the problem non stop but 4 people had been involved with no resolution. I had plans that night with Tim and some friends so as we were leaving, all I could think was "I cannot wait to just relax and laugh tonight and to not think about this anymore."

I get back to the hotel to meet Tim and am excited to just go see everyone. We have a room on the 6th floor. I get on the elevator and the next ten minutes felt like 20 years of my life.

I got stuck on the stupid elevator. It started making weird noises, it wouldn't move, the outer door opened but the inner wouldn't. I'm sitting there thinking, "This seriously happens??" I pick up the emergency phone. Doesn't work. At this point in the day, my cell phone has died because I hadn't charged it the night before. Bad move by me. The elevator continues to make noises and shake but it wouldn't go up. Or down. I actually yelled at people to help me. This was ridiculous. I also tried to pry open the doors. Equally ridiculous. So I sat down in the corner and couldn't decide if I thought the situation was hilarious or if I just wanted to cry because it was so fitting after the events of the day. I was seriously freaked out.

I mean, you always hear about this happening but I didn't know it really did. And who knew that when it does the emergency phones don't always work?? I was shaking so bad... seriously freaking at out at this point. But I just sat in the corner, shaking, on the verge of tears and was just glad that I didn't have to pee or something. I mean, what else can you really do?

10 minutes later...

I start to move... hooray! I jump up and the elevator stops at the third floor. The 3 button is not pressed but I don't give a shit... I just want to get off this stupid thing. I start to make a move but I am not quick enough. The elevator tries to eat me and I am forced back inside. 5 more minutes of sitting in the corner...

FINALLY after what seems like 20 years, I get to floor six. My legs feel like jello to walk because I am pretty shaken up (which subconsciously feels stupid to me since I am not claustrophobic but I did not know that it was so scary to be trapped in an elevator!) I get to the hotel room and Tim opens the door, all excited to see me and to start our night out. I collapse into a huge ball of tears into his arms. Poor guy. He has no clue what is going on. I cannot stop bawling. It was ridiculous.

Eventually my tears turn into laughing much in part to my wonderful husband who knows how to make things feel better... and I start to see how humorous the situation really was. We get ready to go out and have a great night out with good friends, good food, good drinks (even though we walked two blocks to the restaurant and I was pretty sure by the time we got there we were going to be human ice sculptures-it was FREEZING). Sidenote: how do people seriously live in Alaska? I kept asking my friends up there. I just don't get it. It is SO COLD.

Did I mention by the way that we stayed at the nicest hotel in Anchorage? It's called the Captain Cook and it is widely known as the nicest hotel up there. It is definitely nicer than the Hilton or Marriott we have stayed at up there before. I guess my advice is just to stay on floor one or take the stairs. And watch out for elevators. Apparently you really can get stuck in them. Who knew.