these things do happen from time to time

so today was an interesting day. following a night in which i got about three hours of sleep, i had what i thought was a nice breakfast of fruit and french toast. i state "i thought" because, within 15 minutes after i arrived at our regional office, my stomach decided to turn on me. the biggest problem with that turn of events was that i was slated to lead off a fifty participant, three day workshop with a three plus hour presentation. the purpose of said presentation was to provide the background and context of the work of this project and set the tone and direction for the activities to follow.

and lead off the workshop i did. as the saying goes, the show must go on and as long as i was focused on presenting my material, i felt pretty much ok. the second i would step down to allow for an exercise or discussion to take place, and i felt like i was going to be sick all over the conference room in which we were meeting.

i have to admit this was one of the more challenging presentations i've ever given. it's tough enough to speak for that extended an amount of time. it's harder still when you're not feeling your best and even more difficult when you're doing your best to not only appear as if nothing is wrong with you, but to be energetic and enthusiastic about the subject matter. i am happy to share that all went as well as i could imagine it going were i at the peak of good health and spirits. in fact, at the end of the day, as i shared with my fellow presenters/facilitators what my condition had been throughout the day, they were shocked and indicated that they could not tell that anything was amiss.

unfortunately, my stomach has not as yet rebounded, and i'm lying here in my hotel room bed sipping on a ginger ale with hopes that it will help to calm my ailing tummy enough that i might be able to have some crackers later. i haven't had anything to eat since this morning's fateful breakfast (though i'm not entirely sure it was the cause of my ailment), believing that avoiding lunch was the wisest course of action (not that i had any appetite for it at all). the thing that really sucks is that the group went out to dinner at one of my favorite local restaurants (they make an awesome fried chicken).

ah well, i should be grateful that i made it through my presentation and the day successfully and didn't end up giving the kind of memorable performance that would have made everyone lose their appetites.