[This is from Thursday, I'm slowly editing and writing about my NetSquared experience]

I'm writing this while stuffed in the back corner of a Boeing 747, and it's great. Like most times, I just couldn't justify the six hour wait before plunging into this. So, here I am, cramped and wholly uncomfortable, writing about my NetSquared experience while the elderly woman next to me consistently tracks the cursor dancing from margin to margin. It's cool, though. I'm at home entertaining an intimate audience.

It's hard to really tell where I should start the narrative detailing my NetSquared experience. In fact, I really wasn't supposed to attend in the first place. It wasn't until our project lead, Joe Solomon, approached me with an invitation as an aside during one night's project discussion was it even considered.

As we later joked, calling it an invitation was sort of a stretch. It was more in tune with, "Oh, hey, you can totally crash the hotel room if you want." That might even be verbatim. Of course, I saw it as something that shouldn't be passed up, and jumped on it, whatever you want to call 'it' exactly.

It was then, about two weeks before the registration deadline, that we really started exploring the options available for getting me to San Jose.

I ended up being quiet for the day, sticking to my dev work, before I approached Joe with some really, really shamelessly bad ideas on how to put me on a plane and the list. I won't detail them too much now, but just know they were awful. Thankfully, Joe had a bit better of an idea, ask Bernard.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Bernard Dolan, check out his introduction here. I think it's pretty on key.

It's really hard to describe the feeling you get when something so amazing hits you out of nowhere. I don't remember what day of the week it was or what time it was when it happened. It was daylight still, I know that. My phone was also about to die since I definitely remember the haphazard sprint down the hallway to get to my charger. Other than that, it's a blur. I mean, in retrospect, it feels like one of those moments where later in life someone would ask, "Where were you when Joe called?" and I'd be the idiot that couldn't remember.

All I can remember from the call is this: "So, Bernard has decided to pay for..."

I was floored. Knowmore.org has a budget of zero. To decide to help me along blew my mind. I'd describe the rest of the conversation had I been able to comprehend it. I was in some sort of euphoric coma.

An I'm-writing-this-from-a-plane-aside: it's really bothersome if you squirm in your seat as often as you breathe, by the way...Just so you know...you know, in case you're the one doing it.

Okay, now fast-forward two weeks--because it was a pretty intense coma--and all of a sudden I'm sitting in O'Hare at gate C19 waiting for my flight to San Jose. I have to admit...I was totally unimpressed with the bustle of the airport. A lot of times I can pass time effortlessly by watching Passerby Theater. It wasn't the case in Chicago. The crowd just wasn't there for a good drama. I was, however, convinced one fellow that passed by was related to Robert Downing Jr., though. That was, like, the highlight. How sad is that?

So, anyway, I was alternating between pretending to read some Albert Camus and working on the extension for what seemed like seven years when my phone finally lit up with a text. It contained some magic to make things interesting. How can things get interesting when you're waiting for a flight? Bring in the Tom.

Tom, flying in from Providence, RI, was booked on the same connecting flight as me. We've also never met before, ever. I can also count the number of times we had previously talked through all mediums of communication on one hand. This was something huge, my first real-life encounter with Tom Inhaler.

It was sort of bizarre how quickly Tom picked me out as being me. Though, I guess a description of 'white hat and confused' is pretty telling if I have to be honest with myself. After the always awkward first introductions passed, it seemed like Tom and I got along very well. Joe later referred to us as being like cousins, but I have to disagree. Cousins are weird.

We spent the remainder of the time at the gate talking freely about our project, the conference, and how excited we were. When something even weirder, if that is in fact proper usage, happened. While waiting to board the flight, we found someone else going to NetSquared, a team member of MoveSmart.org. All three of us casually chatted as we continued to wait to board the plane.

The flight sucked beyond all means of comprehension. Center seats are the worse and should be stripped from all aircraft ever. No one, especially me, should have to deal with being trapped between two strangers thousands of feet above the Earth. Even more so when the dude next to you is totally digging a movie starring Queen Latifah. The four hours that passed on the flight were potentially the longest in history. Water would have boiled a hundred times over if someone were there to watch. Queen Latifah was too captivating unfortunately.

It was a cool relief when we hit the ground. Tom evidently didn't enjoy the flight, either. I know this because he had sprinted from the tail-end of the plane before I could even manage to crawl out of my seat. Thankfully, when I finally escaped my center-seat purgatory, he was patiently waiting for me outside. Of course, this was only so because he wanted to show me "his precious."

Apparently, SkyMall is full of the most ridiculous merchandise known to man. It's like they literally pay an R&D team to come up with horrible ideas and charge hyper-inflated prices. As we walked to the terminal, Tom gleefully explained to me that he had took it upon himself to find a Champion of the Absurd. He was also quick to tell that he had, hands down.

You ready? In SkyMall, for potentially a limited amount of time, you can purchase an autographed picture of the "Soup Nazi" for a cool two hundred dollars. No joke. If selling your face in SkyMall doesn't mean you've arrived, I don't know what does.

The MoveSmart.org team, which we were reunited with at Taxi-Land of the San Jose International Airport, was apparently so swooned by our boyish charms that they offered to split a cab with us to the hotel. Or it was the other way around? I can't remember. Regardless, one of our teams was a total Casanova.

Okay, consider chapter one complete for now. My laptop is ending its life. More later.