Out & Equal Conference

Ok, so I'm geeky excited to go to my FIRST LGBT conference...the Out & Equal Conference in Baltimore, MD this year! While I'm not LGBT, its still very important for the Ally community to be educated on legal policies, whats happening in the political world, and what other companies are doing to promote diversity and inclusion. Big Daddy D is paying the week long conference and I'm excited to meet people across the nation from my firm and other companies. Pretty sure it will cost about $1K to send each of us for this conference, not including hotel fare or airfare for those that can't drive to Baltimore.

I wont lie, I'm a little scared that Halloween falls mid-week and there is an event we can go to a local bar and dress in costume! EEKK.  There is also a gala dinner too that I can't wait to get dressed up for!

Here's a little summary of what the summit is from their website:

2012 Out & Equal Workplace Summit

Out & Equal's Annual Workplace Summit deserves its international reputation as the premier conference on LGBT issues in the workplace. The Summit provides individuals, human resources professionals, diversity managers, employee resource group (ERG) leaders, and straight allies the perfect platform from which to make powerful connections, share best practices, and formulate a strategy that allows for a powerful demonstration of their commitment to equality for LGBT people in the workplace. The abundance of activities and nationally celebrated keynote speakers result in an experience that has been described as "an enlightening watershed of information."

Some of you might know that I am in the GLOBE & Allies Business Resources Group for big Daddy D. Well, I actually serve two roles: Communications Chair for the DC chapter and I co-lead the  Marketing and Communications team for the National chapter.  Looking forward to representin' the Ally population at the conference in 2 weeks!

Winery Hoppin

This past Sunday we took a winery tour to celebrate my friend Lisa's birthday! Even though I didn't know many of Lisa's friends and none of the other DC Phi Mu ladies could make it, I still had a blast! We had enjoyed lovely 80 degree weather the two days prior, but of course DC decided to change abruptly leaving most of us unprepared for the cold weather, which was even colder in the mountains!

As I said in this post, we visited three wineries:

• Barrel Oak
• Miracle Valley
• La Grange

I had my favorite and my least favorite! Barrel Oak was GORGEOUS inside and out but I liked La Grange's wine better. Miracle Valley was a waste of 30 minutes. Wine tasted watered down and the only good thing about it was that they had a fire pit going on outside to warm up our toesies. Which were freezing because we did our tasting outside under a tent that didn't have any heaters!

Anyways, enough complaining, let's get down to business. Lisa was bad ass and rented out a charter bus to take us to the various wineries. Bad ass in theory but when the bus drive couldn't find Rosslyn (um...even WITH a GPS), he was an hour late. Which mean we had to rush through some of the wineries. Insert sad face here. Once we finally found him and set off on our journey, we finally understood why he couldn't find us. I don't think his GPS had been updated since the early 90s...yeah, true story. Anyways, we set off on our merry way and Lisa had a TON of snacks for us all to eat and also drink while on the bus! I think I ate WAY more than I drank because I was stone sober when I arrived back home. Oh well, still had a great time! I feel so adultish with my winery tours! Granted, I've only been to a few other wineries out in Charlottesville, but still!

I'll leave you with some pictures from our trip:

First up, Barrel Oak!

The inside of this place was BEAUTIFUL! The bar was made to look like a wooden barrel.

The outside seating was amazing. Wish it was warmer and could have sat out there.

Blue ridge mountains

Oodles and oodles of wine!

SO PRETTY

Goodbye Barrel Oak! It was fun while it lasted! The wine was SUPER yummy and I liked about half of them, I'm just not a white wine fan!

On to the second place, Miracle Valley.

At least they had a band playing

And the grounds were really pretty

And there was a little lake

And lots of flowers. Notice how I never mentioned the wine? It was gross. PASS.

On to the third place, La Grange. This place was cute and homey and had REALLY good wine!

There was this McMansion  out a little ways away

There was this adorable little barn on the grounds which housed the below barrels

HOW CUTE!

People purchase these and get a case of wine every year and on the 4th year, you get to keep it! Its a pretty hefty amount, but probably a good deal.

HAHAHAHAH well the crappy bus driver did buy the birthday girl a cake!

I would love to eat a little lunch next to all those barrels

A stopper

Where the magic happens

So apparently the grounds have a ghost. And the ghost likes to have his wine. You can barely see, but on the far left of the mantle, there is a glass of red wine poured. Any time this glass is moved or removed, the ghost does not like it and there are all kinds of electricity problems and other creepy things!

Goodbye La Grange, it was fun!

Birthday Winery Touring

I'm super excited that this weekend I get to celebrate this girl's birthday:

(Lisa is on the left)

and stop by some wineries as well! That's right, Lisa is ringing in her birthday with a winery tour!! We're taking a bus from Rosslyn and visiting three wineries:

• Barrel Oak
• La Grange
• Miracle Valley

We all know how much I love to drink and especially when its in a super fun social atmosphere! (I'm not above drinking a glass or two of wine by myself, while alone in my apartment...hey, don't judge.) Last weekend I went to a Beer Fest and another winery tour last month. I'm looking forward to ringing in this Phi Mu's birthday with a glass or two of fine wine and lots of yummies!

2012 Living Social Beer Fest

OMGEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE this event was SO MUCH FREAKING FUN!!!!! The weather was perfect, the company was amazing, and the beer was a flowin'! I loved that Melissa and Erika came up to do this! Who doesn't love a beer fest? Who doesn't love DC? Throw those two things together and you've got a winning combination!

I made this yummy platter of food Friday night in anticipation of them getting there! We had a quiet awesome night in watching movies. We watched trashy TV and then finally turned on the Five Year Engagement, which in my opinion could have been shortened by like 45 minutes. We never even made it to the end of the movie because we were all so tired!

We woke up early and took a cab to the event. We took so long showering and getting ready and because the metro sucks all adds up to taking a cab! Oh wait, first we walked through the farmer's market that is every Saturday in front of my house. We grabbed a few things to eat and were on our way!

At the beer fest!

Dance party

it was 2 levels of fun

Erika and Melissa before getting schwasted.

Old roomie love

Gah, I love these girls!!

And again!

Bracing for the pain of the slap braclet!

It was a BEAUTIFUL day for this beer fest!

Da Band

Cheers

The lines went so fast sometimes we had to down the beer so we could get a new tasting!

Metro ride home was a sloppy one!

Melissa and I with our free t-shirts!

The Most Expensive Sticker in the World

That teeny tiny little orange sticker is the most expensive sticker in the world. That is my parking pass to parking in my building's garage. Guess how much it costs each month? Just guess..... I dare you......... Each month........... Yeah that bitch is $150 A MONTH. To PARK in a little concrete spot. EEEEKKKKK. Gah, DC is so expensive!!