Good morning!  I am currently sitting at the Minneapolis airport with COFFEE and hanging out for the next hour before my flight leaves for Chicago… then off to New York.  Kim from Sophisticated Dorkiness will be in this same airport , leaving about 30 minutes after me this morning.

Lets recap my morning so far:

1.  up at 3:30 am.  An ungodly hour in case you have never seen it.  😀

2.  Ready and car loaded I pull out of driveway by 4:11 am

3.  Drive in hard rain most of the way to the cities which makes for TENSE driving conditions when it is pitch black out.  Listening to the audio Delicious by Ruth Reichl and that made it pleasant.  🙂

4.  Park in airport parking but have trouble at the ticket station for parking and it does not give me a ticket…. go into parking lot ticket free, hoping my credit card swipe took care of all other “things that make me go STRESS” 😉

5.  check bag.  Pretty much hitch free.

6.  Talk to people in security line, a group of them are going on a tour…. kind of cool.

7.  Find gate and look at it.

8.  Stroll to nearest Caribou Coffee and “Sheila is here”

So……

BEA!  It seems so long ago when Candace and I were chatting back in December about going and rooming together.  I believe she said she is taking a train today.  How cool is that?

I was digging around looking at some old videos I made recently I found this one I made after returning from the book expo in 2011:

It still cracks me up and yes it is a little embarrassing that I did that… but really is sums up the excitement.  If you listen closely you can hear me pause towards the end where I am trying hard not to laugh.  I hope the neighbors didn’t think I was nuts. 😀

So today’s agenda is pretty much just get there.  I land around 4:11 pm, then I need to make my way to our hotel which if all goes well I hope to be there by 5 – 5:30.  I have no plan for tonight so I may catch dinner, a show – or I may just stay in and prep for Wednesday which is a HUGE day.

I will be making posts as I can here, but definitely watch for my posts at Armchair BEA where I will be reporting on events at the expo as well as interviews with publishers, authors, and hopefully a few bloggers.

Yesterday at Armchair BEA they kicked off with an introduction meme and I was too crazy busy to participate but let me give you a small version now:

My name is Sheila and I have been blogging here at Book Journey for 5 years on June 9th.  I love many genres of books so this blog has been a fun outlet for sharing my diverse tastes with fellow readers.  One of the BEST things about writing reviews and bookish posts is that I get to connect with ALL OF YOU.  Some of you I have had the pleasure of meeting thanks to the Book Expo.

I will be at the Expo this week, but as mentioned above I will be chatting about it here, and on Armchair BEA.  You can still register to be a part of the arm chair…. I highly recommend it 😀

Most of you know me from my pic above, but since my hair has been cut since that pic – I will give you this one I took yesterday so those attending the expo hopefully recognize me and will say hi.  Seriously, say hi – it would be awesome to meet you in person and I am really tunnel visioned while at the expo so feel free to trip me to get my attention.

See you on the BLOG!  😀