THE FIRST WEEK

WHAT a week it has been. We left Las Vegas just over a week ago from the Mass Torts Made Perfect Convention and headed for San Francisco. It was great to see everyone in Vegas so we were sad to leave early. Check-in time was 3 PM at the hotel - and at that meeting we were given a briefing on the rules and regs, walkie talkies were handed out - and we were given our first scavenger booklet. Each booklet has dozens and dozens of challenges, riddles and competitions and you have a specific amount of time to complete as many of the challenges as you can. Each challenge has a different point system so there is strategy involved as to how you organize the challenges. SAN FRANSCISCO - Rainey and I took off at a run to start the challenges and quickly realized that running in San Francisco involves one hill after another - quite a feat. We finished up quite a few in Chinatown - including one that made us find this dead-end alley and "find what is cooking there and eat it". After asking like 10 people, we found the alley - but could only find an acupuncture shop, a florist - and then we found - a fortune cookie making store where they were cooking up fresh fortune cookies. We ate 2 each. That scavenger rally ended at 7 PM at a restaurant. During dinner we were told to go and get packed up ... we were leaving for China. We took a 1 AM flight to Hong Kong and from there on to Beijing.