Who are you, what are you doing, and where have you been?

I know, I know. What can I say? Life moves really quickly on the road and I don't always have enough time to even think about it, let alone write. When last we met I was in the midst of a month in Thailand. My student semester tour ended there with tearful goodbyes and lots of plans to visit foreign friends in the future. What happened beyond that? TONS! Here are some highlights.

Directly following Thailand, a group of us from the cast stayed in L.A. in what we termed "Cast L.A. 2008." It was a fantastic experience orchestrated by one of our castmates. It was almost a mini-version of our tour. We had host families and even had an allocation meeting. We got an RV donated for us to use which was really nice. We had mini morning meetings to discuss the day's logistics and re-live the past six months of our lives. It was a lot of fun.

From there I went directly to Hawaii, where another group of castmates was vacationing. I stayed with that group on Oahu for a few days before heading to the big island. I met my family on the big island and was there for a week for my brother's wedding. It was probably the most laid-back wedding that's ever occurred. We procured the use of a hole on the golf course the day before the ceremony was scheduled and had a beautiful sunset wedding overlooking the ocean. I even got to walk the bride down the aisle. It was great spending time with the family as well.

From there I flew back to San Francisco where I re-packed my bags, said hello to my dog, and slept for four hours before getting back on a plane to Denver. I was in Denver for 6 weeks, one week for a pre-staging private events show (in layman's terms that means I did about 30 hours of dancing in 3 days and then performed) and 5 for staging. That's when the loooonnnng days started. Coordinating logistics for an international tour of 107 people from 21 countries is a tall order. I'm still in my learning curve, but am getting more and more confident every day. It's lots of work but lots of fun.

While in Denver I was staying with the producer of the show and his wife, who was on UWP staff for many years. It was really relieving to have a family that understood what it was like to be doing what I am doing. When I got there, their younger son was just learning to walk. I was there for his first birthday (chocolate cake covered face and all) and by the end he was almost running. We went on a hike by a beautiful mountain lake, which was a first for both of the boys, to which the older son exclaimed, "I love hiking!" They were also there for me learning how to drive and getting my driver's license. Yes, it's true. Seven years after the rest of my peers I've finally experienced the rite of passage into mobility.

From Denver we hit the road and our first stop was Breckenridge. Breckenridge is beautiful. The mountains are unlike those in the places I've been and it's so beautiful in the summer it makes it easy to see why people flock to it in the winter. We managed to get condos donated so all the staff was able to stay together. It was great for bonding. We went out to eat, watched some olympics, and just shared some good stories as we prepared for the most challenging part of our journey thus far...

Mexico! That's right, our second week on the road took us into Mexico. Our first stop was La Paz, an ocean-side city with crystal clear waters and poor drainage systems. Upon our arrival in La Paz, we drove through the central part of town which was completely flooded. The water almost reached the bottom of our bus in parts, and we saw vehicles getting stuck in the streets. It wasn't even raining when we were there, but there was nowhere for the water to go so it just stayed there.

From there we hit Los Cabos, but that deserves it's own post. So that's it for now. There will be more to come... at some point. Tonight is our last night in Tepic and tomorrow we're off to Culiacan.

Hasta luego,
~Molly