Traveling Thoughts

Missing NYC

Happy Wednesday! Oy, it's been a rough two weeks as I've been traveling for work  - Chicago last week and LA this week. I don't typically travel for work so having to travel two weeks in a row has been brutal. I'm not sure what day it is or what time zone I'm in.

Here are a few bits and tidbits about business travel that have been running through my head lately.

1. The hardest part. I think that one of the hardest things for me, aside from being away from my family, is trying to stay healthy and active while I'm away. I think that it's largely because my schedule is out of my control and my days are often long and filled with catered meals.

2. Hunger! For some reason, when I'm on an airplane, I'm constantly hungry. Maybe it's the weird cabin pressure? So, I try to pack snacks from home both for the journey and for the trip itself since I know that there will be catered food, cookies and candy at the office or that I will be tempted to buy a bag of chips at the airport. The problem is that I have a hard time finding good snacks to bring with me. I would love to bring Kind Bars or Larabar or even packets of peanut butter to spread on apples but I can't. I have a severe peanut/tree nut allergy which eliminates most of these snacks.

3. Working out. For some reason I will get up and at 6am and work out when I'm away but cannot for the life of me get up at that hour when I am home.

4. Air conditioning. Why does every hotel and office building have to be freezing?? Regardless of what part of the country I am traveling to, I have to pack a number of sweaters or wraps to bundle up in since the air conditioning is often turned all the way up.

5. Green Smoothie Challenge. As you may know, I'm in the midst of a 30 day green smoothie challenge. I was really worried about keeping up with the challenge while I was away from home. I guess it's a good thing that I'm in LA this week. There are almost as many juice/smoothie bars as there are Starbucks. Phews.

6. Health issues. It never fails that when I am away from home, I get sick or something happens that requires medical attention. OK, maybe not every time that I travel but often enough that it's no longer a surprise. If you follow me on Twitter, you may have seen a tweet yesterday morning saying that I spent the morning in the ER. Yup - true story. On the way to the client site, my right eye started becoming incredibly irritated. By the time we arrived, my right eye was red and angry. I couldn't open it and couldn't see. Luckily, there was an ER close by. Apparently, I have some small speckled scratches on my cornea. 14 hours later, it's better but still very irritated. Great way to make an impression on a client, no?

Do you travel for work? How do you maintain a healthy balance when you are away from home? Do you have any peanut/tree nut-free snack suggestions??