Maggie Reads: Conference Blog

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Sunday, January 21, 2007

My Midwinter Mistakes...

Regrets, I've had a few...

Insisting on being at all conference events from the opening ceremony. Just who do I think I am, Leslie Burger? (The good stuff always happens Sat through Tues or is it the grass is always greener.)
Staying at historical hotels not on the bus route. One would think I would pack Skechers and not Jessica Simpsons!
Waiting until the last minute to register. We don't need no stinkin' badges! BUT, we LOVE to wait in lines!
Forgetting my business cards. Just what kind of Public Services Librarian am I?
Not paying attention to my flight schedule! If the price is too good to be true you have just bought a redeye! We walk back from The Namesake at 11:00pm and rub the laptop to see what time our flight leaves on Sunday afternoon. 12:50am on Sunday? That can't be right! Fifteen minutes in daze looking at tickets, five minutes to get taxi, fifteen minutes to pack and be ready for taxi, five minutes to check out, twenty minute drive, etc. We pulled all our bags in the back door at 10:00am! Can you say Zombies!

Back in M.I.S.S.

...sung to the Beatles' tune Back in the USSR.

I've made a huge, costly mistake; however, this is my normal learning curve. I now know that Midwinter is more meetings than programs. One might have warned me--remember the hard head--but I still would need to experience it myself.

This is not to say Midwinter is not valuable to those ALA orbiting members. Those of us who want to be involved and just haven't been shot down, yet. The two meetings I attended were quite open to non-committee members' input. Those meetings being, RUSA CODES, Readers Advisory, 8am Saturday and LITA, Internet Resources and Services Interest Group, 10am Saturday.

I did manage to find a program on Saturday; Google Presents: Tales, Tips and Tools for Libraries was informative and fun. My director will be giving a presentation to faculty and staff involving Google; which I will be able to contribute to. We already have an English department head who is quite efficient with Google Book Search and Google Scholar.