B-day on the road - but never alone

This past week I had a pretty grueling travel schedule which involved 21 separate meetings in 2 cities (NYC and Boston). In the midst of all of that was my birthday. Now my family was extremely disappointed that I could not be with them and could not understand why the trip was not planned around me. Needless to say I was disappointed too but able to rationalize that things sometime don't work the way we prefer. I did receive some very nice "HAPPY BIRTHDAY DADDY" voice mails seemingly screamed into the phone at the other end. Those were appreciated and nice to catch in between meetings.

I was also traveling with two colleagues though it must be said they didn't (thankfully) make too much of the affair.

What I thought was particularly nice and interesting was that this was my first "facebook" birthday. Facebook if you are not familiar is a social networking site where you can find and associate with friends, co-workers and acquaintances and amongst other things you can post personal details like family status, contact details, links to blogs and birthdays. I am a pretty open guy so my birthday information is there and Facebook is kind enough to notify people when "friends" have an approaching birthday.

What was surprising were the number of "happy birthday" wishes I got from my relatively modest number of facebook friends, which includes close and distant friends, work colleagues past and present as well as other acquaintances. It didn't matter that I was on the road in the middle of a near death march of meetings, people literally reached out to me from across the globe to give me best wishes (and in some cases medical advice for Nicolas's eczema, thanks Kate!).

It definitely warmed my heart to know folks out there actually pay attention and care enough to take the time. to send me a note.

Thanks to everyone for making my b-day on the road a little less lonesome!

I vow to return the favor as often as possible.