Uncle Joe's Travels

Uncle Joe has been doing a little travelling with work lately. First, I spent a few days up in Kansas City, Missouri at a conference on sustainability in laboratories.

Only picture I could take at the conference. Uncle Joe goes to a lot of conferences where photographs are highly frowned upon.

The sustainability conference was really cool and there were a lot of like-minded scientists, engineers, and architects that I got to geek out with and throw around energy and resource saving ideas.
Usually when I'm travelling on business, I like to be a hermit and stay in my hotel room, but Aunt Christine has been demanding I get out and at least eat some local fare. So I went to one of our favorite places to eat when we go down to the Carolinas.

I love me some Zaxby's! They have them in Columbia and in Kansas City. Supposedly it's because Mizzou is now in the SEC, so the southern food now has a market. I couldn't care less about Mizzou, but I sure love Zaxby's.
Kansas City, like St. Louis, is well known for its craft beer breweries, so I looked for one near the conference and stopped into a tap room after a long day of lectures.

Cinder Block Brewery: The Paver's Porter was very nice

On the drive home, I stopped in at Kansas City Cupcake Company and got some cupcakes to bring back to make sure I was in Aunt Christine's good graces by the time I got home.

I also tried to stop in at the Missouri Mavericks' stadium store to find a puck for a certain "horrid" knucklehead that I know. The Mavericks are the ECHL affiliate of the NY Islanders and the St. Louis Blues. Unfortunately, contrary to their website, they were closed.

I did see this place on the way out of town. Made me think about actually being a farmer; if I could raise a herd of pizzas, I'd do it for free.

The following week, I went to glamorous Decatur, Illinois for a smaller conference on seed testing with representatives from all the major agriculture players. There's nothing in Decatur, so I told Aunt Christine to shut it, and grabbed myself a Domino's pizza and crashed in the hotel room.

Hope you guys are doing well. It's no Copenhagen, but I made the best of driving around the American heartland. Can't wait to tour around Europe with you guys!