So, there's an Open Source Geo conference in South Africa, September 29, 2008 – October 3, 2008. My boss wants me to go. In theory, great. In practice...
Travel is a 24 hour flight -- at least -- each way. Okay, so that's not so horrible -- but for just 5 days of a conference, it's a bit much.
"No problem", thinks I, "I'll do some South Africa Tourism while I'm there!"
But wait, says brain. Girls -- including Jess -- will have just started school. You would essentially be abandoning Jess for two weeks during her first semester back at school in a year with an 11 year old drama queen and an over-energetic 7 year old geek girl. Wouldn't that be cruel and unusual punishment?
So now I'm kinda stuck: I'd really like to go, and I'd really like to see South Africa, but I feel like I can't go, because it would mean leaving Jess alone with the kids for too long, and I don't really want to go just for the conference.
I dunno. Maybe I'm being silly -- maybe it's worth it to fly to South Africa for the conference. I mean, it'd be a nice conference to be at, but there's just a lot of cost involved for something so short, in my mind.
Am I crazy? What should I do here?
Would Jess feel that is a viable solution?
I mean, most of the time when I go to conferences, the girls end up missing school -- which isn't so horrible -- but if *you* ended up missing school, that would pretty majorly suck.