How my business trip turned into a vacation, almost.

It's the cardinal rule.
You don't get the important thing out to show off to show off to the assembled luminaries, when you're in a bar, jetlagged, and into your third beer.
The important thing in this case is the mock-up of my The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard. It took me and Anne four hours to photocopy in colour and wee Cal spent most of a day sticking on the word balloons.
And the problem with three beers is that they are apt to undermine your grasp of the cardinal rule.

It was around three o'clock the next day when I realized it was missing.
First place I went to of course was the bar. One day I intend to write a book about things left in bars. During the short spell I worked in one in Blackpool, while I was polishing glasses on a Sunday morning, an attractive girl came in and mumbled something with her hand half over her mouth. I cocked my ear. She mumbled again. She had lost her false teeth the previous night and was retracing her steps.

The mock-up wasn't in the hotel bar. But I hadn't been off the premises, to the best of my recollection. I went back to the room and consulted my external hard-drive. He was snoozing and objected to being woken up. I got through to him the intense importance of the situation. I was to hand the mock-up to my editor, the illustrious Mr. Mark Siegel that night so that we could discuss it over dinner the following night and map out all that had to be done on it before the absolute deadline three weeks away.
"While I was looking at the turtles in the decorative pond, you went to the bathroom."
The restroom in the hotel lobby. Of course. It wasn't there now. I asked a porter. he pointed to the front desk.
yup. They had it. I described page 15 in intimate detail to prove ownwership (since it hadn't occurred to me to write my name on it) and all was well.
Right, i'm off to breakfast.