“An American executive and a German guy wearing a crumpled baseball cap walk into a train…” This sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, but in actuality it describes my activities at 7:30 AM this morning. I had been tasked with a show-and-tell type of mission on this particular Friday – specifically, accompany this visiting corporate exec, in from Kansas City, out to a French hospital and show him what we are dealing with. I also had invited an associate over from Germany, hoping that he would be able to help out with the topic which was the purpose of my day’s meeting. Quite honestly, I cannot think of better conditions under which to wow a company exec: travel to a French client site for a meeting (which will be in half English, half French) about something that I know little about (the project changed last week) while being supported by a mysterious German (who actually knows precious little in regards to the day’s subject) with a penchant for chain-smoking and wearing black baseball caps.
Truthfully the day wasn’t too bad, with the exception of having to travel about an eighty minutes out of my way to pick up my visitors. Not the most pleasant thing to do early in the morning, but given that was the worst thing to happen to me today – and that includes the train breaking down on the way out of Paris – I’ll take it! To commemorate the day I rewared myself with a refreshing Orangina at lunch, something I would recommend doing consistently if you have the means.
