I apologize for the dearth of my blogging lately. You have seen my schedule, but you don’t see the amount of transit time it takes to get between hotels and rooms with the huge amount of baggage I carry. While I am sitting in so many meetings, I am taking the time to get to know the people around me. I am discovering that it is not as vital for me to take minute minutes with every person’s conversation. Instead, I am taking the time to listen carefully and to go around to actually meet people.
I am sad that some of you are not here. You meet absolutely wonderful passionate people who work hard to make all libraries better. You meet delegates from all divisions that are concerned about developing relationships with school librarians. You meet friends from years past. You meet publishers who listen to you when you ask for certain types of books for your populations. You meet authors who are so excited to hear the personal stories you can tell them about your students’ interactions with their titles. You meet some nut cases that you think “You’re a librarian?!” (Note, I took the phrase nut cases from an ALA Council document on obstacles that prevent ALA members from running for a council seat.)
I have yet to meet a nasty person or anyone who refuses to help. I met new people at the AASL 101 program where we tried to communicate what AASL is, why, and how you should be involved. I met delegates of the Chinese American Library Association (you rock!). I met many new members to the profession. I met YALSA members who are passionate about intellectual freedom, access, and strong nonfiction for the YA crowd. I met the leaders of ALA and they are actually human. Even the parliamentarian Eli is a real person who strives to help everyone understand complicated vocabulary and reasons for procedures.
For those of you who dismiss the concept of attending due to finances, I want to tell you that you can do this conference on a limited budget. I drove this year. Friends with me are providing the gas. Another friend with us took the van on to his friend’s house for free parking (vs. $30 per day). Two other friends (Margaret and Lynn) that have their room provided by the state organization are allowing me to crash their room with them to stay. As for food, since Friday morning I have spent $8.50 for soup, roll, & drink at the Natural History Museum and $7.70 for french onion soup at the Hotel Washington skyline terrace restaurant so we could see the DC skyline at night. All other meals have come from conference events, packages of crackers, and even a generic version of Slim-Fast to replace a meal. There are vendor events and receptions that have provided appetizers. The hotel has coffee in the room. The exhibit hall had tons of little snacks and there will even be a big closing event with food. I use the ALA shuttle buses or walk instead of cabs. If I have to take a cab, I’ll ask people
You can do this conference on very little funds. I’d love to hear the techniques you use to save money at conference.
