039|365 Welcome Click

039|365 Welcome Click, originally uploaded by erinbyrnenyc.

Woo-hoo! I woke up today and could actually breathe with my mouth closed. I'm on the mend. I may even have some wine tonight to celebrate. But in the meantime, I have to entertain Click the Bird.

Click is the traveling friend of the Flickr 366-1 Group. Essentially he comes to hang with you for a day or two and you do fun things with him and photograph it. It's almost like having an invisible friend except he isn't invisible. So, today Click helped me sew, enjoyed the view, picked out music, and played dolls with Maddie and wii games with Kira. It was a busy day for Click and tomorrow she'll go on to her next stop.

038|365 Still Sick

038|365 Still Sick, originally uploaded by erinbyrnenyc.

Woke up Saturday and my nose was still stuffy, my throat still scratchy, my glands swollen, and my overall head feeling like it might implode. I essentially spent the day on the couch in a hot flannel nightgown and spent my time working, surfing, or or pretending to have half a shot in my fantasy golf league.

037|365 Home Sick

037|365 Home Sick, originally uploaded by erinbyrnenyc.

Home sick on Friday, much to the relief of my colleagues. I'm such a wimp that even Ludens taste medicinal, but at least I resisted the urge to spike my orange juice with champagne. Or worse, vodka.

036|365 Zach Ambrose

036|365 Zach Ambrose, originally uploaded by erinbyrnenyc.

I took this picture of fellow 365er Zach Ambrose kind of as a goof. I was just joking around with him, and took it on my Blackberry. Good thing I did as it was the only picture I snapped all day. I was sicker than sick, coughing and sneezing on everyone all day (Sorry!) and I'm lucky I got this one

I had intended to include Zach in the photostream at some point, and I'll definitely get a better shot at some point. But in the meantime, thanks for the safety Zach.

035|365 Technology and Design

035|365 Technology and Design, originally uploaded by erinbyrnenyc.

Well today wasn't the best day ever. I went to Washington to and spent some time with our CEO and also with my team there, and my cold is definitely getting worse. Despite this, I traveled from DC to NY to have dinner with some of my team. Rome and Chris, technology and creative directors respectively, are such great colleagues that even a cold couldn't keep me away. Not pictures is James, director of social media, because his picture was taken with me and I look like hell from the cold. Thanks for your hard work guys, and a great dinner on Wednesday. It almost made the day worth it!

034|365 Wild Kingdom

034|365 Wild Kingdom, originally uploaded by erinbyrnenyc.

Turns out I wasn't feeling much better by Tuesday, and I had a mandatory meeting with my boss on Wednesday, so I decided to work from home again. Working from home is usually an excuse to work 16 hours instead of 12 as there is no commuting time and much less socializing. The only break today was looking into the back yard and seeing the deer and turkeys looking for food.

033|365 Homework

I was sick, so I decided to work from home today. It wasn't a full blown cold, but was well on its way. Given how much is coming up I decided to try to nip it in the bud. The house was a mess, so this cute plant that Maddie was growing for school became the subject of the day.

032|365 Superbowl

Normally we host a big Superbowl party, but this year was a little quieter. Between all my travel, the rough winter and folks being sick, Maddie, John and I just hung out and watched the game. Maddie dressed for the occasion, although her choice of stuffed animal shows her preference. I have so many friends in Pittsburgh and all the Transitions folks were cheering for the Steelers so I bowed to peer pressure and rooted for the Steelers too.

031|365 Throwaway

I named this shot Throwaway because I took it on my way out of the new Innisbrook clubhouse Saturday morning. I didn't take it to be the picture for the day, but rather to remind myself of where we want some signage during the Transtions Championship. Then I got home and fell asleep and didn't take any more pictures. So, luckily I had this to fill the gap. The new clubhouse is awesome, for the record.

030|365 The Bus

I was at the Superbowl Radio Row on Friday with Transitions as we had Lesley Visser acting as brand ambassador doing interviews. Transitions' President Brett Craig was on hand and did some interviews too. Lesley and Brett were great, but a highlight was being introduced to Former Steeler halfback Jerome Bettis by Teri Wagner, if for nothing else than bragging rights with my friends from Pittsburgh.

029|365 Legends for Charity

I flew back to Tampa on Thursday with Gerald, and basically got to Innisbrook in time to run a rake through my hair and race to the Legends of Charity dinner. We were Lesley Visser's guests as Transitions sponsored her to be a brand ambassador on radio row Friday morning. Gerald and Paul looked as dapper as ever, and meeting Lesley was fun. She is quite charming, and we knew she'd do a great job the next day.

028|365 Cactus

After the presentations on Tuesday, Connie and I raced to the airport and flew to Phoenix to meet up with Grady and Gerald and go to the FBR Open. I've always loved cacti and I really love Arizona so it was fun to be there, even for a day. While at the FBR we visited with Matt Killen, the youngest swing coach on the PGA TOUR, and Kenny Perry, a fabulous pro golfer who is also a Transitions spokesperon.

027|365 Trevor Immelman

That's right ladies - Trevor Immelman was in the house. Transitions signed Trevor Immelman and Kenny Perry to be brand amabassadors for Transitions lenses and Trevor was gracious enough to make an in-person appearance at the marketing/golf general session. Connie and Greg did a great job - they bantered back and forth about which player to sign and then let the audience decide. The votes were even (or evenish) so they announced to the crowd of 800 customers that there were going to sign them both. The crowd went wild, and Trevor entered the room to a standing ovation. It was a lot of fun, and Connie had more air than Michael Jordan on his best day as she was cheering Trevor on.

Other highlights that we saw from the audience (thanks Rach for playing the role of photographer) included Greg's skydiving video, Connie arriving with Mickey, and unveiling the golf TV spot, "Light and Shadows" to the audience to much appreciation. Unfortunately Paul was sick so he had to watch the action. Most importantly though, both Greg and Connie did an awesome job!

026|365 Dinner

Today was another long and busy day. There were several presentations in the morning, and then we spent the afternoon rehearsing and reworking the North America marketing and golf presnetations. The group met for an awesome dinner that night at Todd English's Blue Zoo in the Dolphin hotel. (Why did they name it the Dolphin - kinda dumb if you ask me.)

Anyway, the sea bass was fab, the wine delish and the company great. It was especially awesome that Sandy could come as she is usually so busy at these meetings that we don't get to hang out.

After dinner some of us headed over to JellyRolls for a few beers and bad music. It was really fun to spend time with Sandy and Julie when we could "let our hair down" and Chris and Shane are always a blast. We had a lot of laughs, but I didn't stay out late as Tuesday was the big day and I needed to have a decent night's rest.

025|365 Golf

Sunday was an early morning as we headed to Disney's Magnolia Course to play a round of golf. There were about 40 people in total, but two groups representing the Transitions "golf team." Me, Connie, Gerald and Big Al Mylnarski (our talent for the TV spot) played against Paul from Transitions, Bart Kendall from IMG, and Julie Tyson from the PGA TOUR. The idea was that you take the two best scores from each hole - the losing team at the end was to wear the Mickey ears that night. We thought we lost, but Julie checked the math and it turns out we won by one stroke. Connie generously told them they didn't need to wear the ears. Connie is clearly too nice and should have checked with her team before letting them off the hook! :)

After golf we rushed back to the conference center at Disney's Yacht Club for rehearsal with Connie, Paul, Dan and Greg before a golf meeting, before the opening reception, before another team dinner. Another busy day, but it was awesome to have some downtime in the morning, although the week was just getting started and I was afraid I'd end up regretting it...

024|365 Skydiving?

Saturday was a busy day at Academy. One of the activities was filming Greg and Vanessa for the introduction to their respective North America nd Latin America marketing presentations. We filmed them skydiving on green screen and the Disney folks worked their magic to show them inside a plane, doing aerial tumbles, and the landing with their parachutes. The idea was that they were soaring to new heights to explore success. Corny? Yeah. But it worked. And to see Greg in this outfit was just hilarious. He is a pretty stoic guy, not much to say until he has a lot to say, and definitely one of the smartest people I know. Even funnier than the outfit though was the sound effects they had him record - wees and aaahhhs at 10,000 feet - which are sounds I don't think ever came from Greg's mouth before. The video turned out great, and they made quite an impression as they began their presentations.

Earlier in the day we had filmed a golf opening for Connie. The premise with her video that as Greg finished talking about North America marketing he'd call Connie to the stage, but she wouldn't show up. He then pulled out his blackberry and called her to get a message that "she was at a very important meeting and would call back Thursday." He then used a GPS device to find her location, and she was on the golf course with Mickey. We did a skit where she couldn't sink the putt with regular sunglasses but with Transitions lenses she was just perfect and made the putt. She and Mickey then took off in his special golf cart and during the presentation she and Mickey drove into the auditorium in the golf cart.

It was a fun day, but a lot of work. We ended the day with a golf team dinner at Shula's which is always fun, and always filling. We had a lot of laughs, but it was only the beginning of our Academy adventure.

023|365 Amazing Art

So, yes, I've been missing in action. It has been a crazy week - over 7 days I flew from NY to Orlando for Transitions Academy, and then on to Scottsdale AZ for the FBR Open PGA TOUR event, and then back to Tampa FL for activities around the Superbowl. I am 9 days behind and will spend a lot of the day today getting caught up.

Rewinding to last Friday, Shane and I got to Orlando and holed up in my room to work on Transitions' marketing and golf presentations. But the highlight of the day was when Shane and I went down to the dining room to join Connie at her grandson's first birthday party. Connie had commissioned a painting from Shane of her two grandson's and had asked him to present it to her daughter's family at Truman's birthday party.

To say Cheryl, Phil and the boys were surprised would be an understatement. Surprised, delighted, touched, impressed, and so on. Connie is such a loving Grandma and her commissioning this painting is another representation of that. And Shane is an amazing artist - he did a wonderful job of capturing the essence of the boys in a very modern way. Everyone loved the piece, and they loved meeting the artist too.