I can’t wait to see the sea lions at Fisherman’s Wharf! Give him some lovin’ by Prayitno from Flickr (Creative Commons License)

Holy crap! The Undeniable Tour is less than two weeks away! I feel like all the big pieces of this trip have been taken care of (speaking gigs, airline tickets, rental car, lodging, dog sitter, etc.) and now I feel like I am a little overwhelmed with all the little details that go into planning such a big trip. I want to make the most of this adventure both for my audience and for myself (professionally and personally), so I am trying to figure out how many people and what awesome things I can see and do between my speaking engagements.

I will admit I am a bit neurotic and I generally thrive when my life has structure, so now I am trying to plan out what I will be doing each day and determine how many friends I will be able to see during my down time. My prediction is I will have a full itinerary of meetings and fun.

I am also trying to make sure that everything is shipshape on the home front before I leave town. I found an amazing pair of Canadian snowbirds to be my house and dog sitters, and because I am an over-prepared dork, I am creating a manual for them information about taking care of my home, caring for my dog, and fun things to do in my city. One of the benefits of staying with locals is you get to learn about all the awesome things in a city that a typical tourist would not know about. I am treating my house sitters like they are my guests and I want to make the most of their experience.

Even though I am a minimalist, I decided I wanted a memento from The Undeniable Tour, so I bought a wooden arrow at the craft store, painted it metallic green, and I am going to ask many of the people I meet with during this trip to sign it. One of the take away messages of The Undeniable Tour is, “Keep moving forward.” This arrow will be a physical embodiment of that message and the people I will asked to sign it are movers and shakers in the legal and social media worlds who exemplify it in their work.

On top of all this, I am trying to get through as much open client work as I can before I leave town so that there is not much that I have to do for them while I am on the road. I will be checking my emails and messages, and I can always find a coffee shop or co-working space if I need to work on a project for a client, but I prefer to “clear the decks” as much as possible when I am going to be out of the office for more than a few days.

If you are interested in connecting with me while I am traveling please follow me on Twitter. If you have any questions or comments about The Undeniable Tour, please shoot me an email.

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