Leaving on a jet plane...

On Wednesday, July 29th I'll be here:

with my friend, Katey! We'll be attending the CFRI 22^nd National Cystic Fibrosis Family Education Conference from July 31st to August 2nd, 2009. Flights are booked, hotel is paid and we will soon be busy planning our sight-seeing adventures since we have an extra day or so of free time (all day Thursday & most of Friday).

Katey received her medical clearance today and I'm working on mine. In order to ensure our health and safety during the Conference (which is good!), there are several medical requirements and guidelines that must be observed. For CF patients, one of those includes an updated sputum culture. Basically they want to ensure that you aren't pan-resistant to antibiotics or harboring any nasties like B. Cepacia. Although I have to wait for the results of this new culture, I typically co-habititate with two strains of Psuedomonas (not pan-resistant) and one strain of Staph (not MRSA).

My nurse just told me that it "doesn't matter how cute that guy is, if I come home with B. Cepacia she'll whip my tail." I professed my innocence, but (she thinks, at least) that she knows me better than that. Just jokes!

Barring anything unforeseen, it looks like our trip is a go.

We are staying at the Sofitel Hotel in Redwood City. It's about ten minutes from the airport and from my understanding about twenty minutes from the city proper.


From the reviews, this seems like a pretty nice place (check out the pics below that I heisted from Google). I think it's near the entrance to Silicon Valley and shares a business park with Oracle and EA.

Any suggestions for must-see touristy stuff in San Fran? Please comment me with your top recommendations!

One of our doctors is presenting at the conference this year. Dr. Young and I have always had a good relationship and his daughter and I are both Dee Gee's. She came to visit me in the hospital one time and showed up with cookies (that'll definitely earn some bonus points). I don't think Dr. Young has ever quite forgiven me for the crates of sorority t-shirts that I "gifted" to his daughter (hey, I was trying to get rid of them!). I hope he doesn't mind us "crashing" the conference to hear his talk.

Dr. Young's presentation is about the transition from pediatric to adult care. I was one of the few guinea pigs that transferred over to UAB when our adult program started (nine years ago). The transition definitely had its rough spots -- I think the patients at Children's were a little too used to getting their way -- but I love it now. It's my home away from home. Hell, with as much time as I spend there, I should have my own room. =)

I'll keep you posted about the trip as more information comes around. I would love to hear from any others that have been or are attending the Conference or San Francisco. I am looking forward to meeting a new group of CF patients, caregivers, doctors, and hopefully making some new friends!