Collin Vs. Blog

I would have blogged this yesterday, if I hadn't had to wake up before the sun to hitch a ride to Albany with Derek and Madeline in order to provide audiential support for their appearance at a regional conference. As it was, and as you'll note if you visit the site, the organizers failed to include one crucial piece of information: the actual, physical location of the conference. This was not good. We:

1. Checked the Humanities building, since the English department was one of the hosts
2. Checked the Library, after being sent there by someone in the Humanities building
3. Checked the Arts and Sciences building, after failing to acquire any information in the library (with the exception of the fact that there is no weekend switchboard)
4. Checked the bizarre subterranean area
5. Checked the student center, whereupon a poster outside the GSO office tipped us to the location of the keynote address
6. Determined that the Life Sciences building was best accessible through the Biology building
7. Felt like lab rats, until
8. Finally locating the conference, with approximately 10 minutes to spare before their panel was set to start

All of which leads me to offer Rule #1 of Conference Hospitality:

Rule #1: Design all materials for an audience that includes at least one person who has never been there before.

In a small fit of revenge, I didn't register for the conference (which goes against my general rule supporting these kinds of conferences) and went ahead and ate lunch anyway, so as to recoup some of the caloric debt they incurred by not telling us where the thing was happening.

And as tends to be the case with small conferences, I was one of two people who stayed for the entire session, not counting the moderator and panelists. It brought back fond memories for me of all the tiny conferences I've attended where I presented more for the practice of presenting than anything else.

Oh, and I finally got to inter-f2f with Alex, whose talk--you guessed it--was scheduled directly opposite Derek and Madeline. At least he's got a transcript of his talk available...

And I would have blogged all this yesterday, had I not fallen asleep at 6 pm. That is all.