Gettin' in the groove...

I created a 90% draft of my presentation yesterday, and then decided to join in the first evening's festivities. I got down to the exhibit area about 40 minutes before the main reception was to start and walked around, doing a preliminary reconnaissance.

The booksellers exhibiting at the conference were already swamped and doing a land-office business. The items on display reflected the breakdown of the Association's membership, with more reference works available in Spanish, French, and German than in Russian, Japanese, and Chinese. I met a few old acquaintances, including Doug Robinson, from the University of Mississippi, Nancy Luetzow, a translator from St. Louis, Missouri, and Laura Wolfson, an interpreter from Philadelphia, but all in all, I have not yet met with all the people I expected to see. I understand some of them won't be attending. Ah, well.

The reception was well attended, and I met several new people, including one fellow from Oregon who seems very knowledgeable in translation memory products. He prefers Déjà Vu to Trados, and I must make it a point to understand why. The food at the reception was plentiful and generally hot, and the food and drink stations were numerous enough to avoid seeing long lines of people waiting to be served a slice of tenderloin or a glass of wine.

There appears to be something wrong with my phone. Yesterday, as I was retiring, I called the hotel operator for a 7:30 am wakeup. This morning, I woke up at 7:55 am on my own. I called downstairs a few minutes ago to let the hotel know what happened, and they maintain that not only did they try to call, but that they left me a voicemail message to that effect. Unfortunately, the message light on my phone is not blinking, so the operator vowed to have a technician come up and check my phone equipment.

Yesterday, some time after leaving the McDonald's at breakfast time and before going for a swim in the hotel pool in the late morning, I misplaced my glasses. Fortunately, I do not need them to function, though I have noticed that I have been having to remove them more often in order to see things up close. It may very well be that they have outlived their usefulness and that it's time to go visit the eye doctor again. Still, it's annoying to lose them like that.

The first order of business at the conference today was to attend the opening general session, where amendments were discussed and new officers elected. I managed to slip out between those two phases to go upstairs and change. I had started the day with a jacket and tie, but found it was too hot for that getup (even with the air conditioning) and changed into an aloha shirt for that "informal" look. After the election, I went to the McDonald's across the street to eat lunch and also to inquire along the way if my eyeglasses had been turned in to "Guest Services" (which also serves as a lost & found). I won free food at the McD's, and had a reasonable lunch; no joy otherwise. Upon returning to the hotel, I changed yet again into a "dry" set of clothes. At this rate, I'll be out of fresh clothes by noon tomorrow. The obvious solution to keep from profusely perspiring, I suppose, is to not move around too vigorously, and mainly to not go outside. Considering all upcoming activities, the first part will be tough; the second, a no-brainer.

There's something wrong with my modem, and the troubleshooting tips offered by Windows 98 on this laptop are not sufficient to deal with the problem. I got the thing to work by fiddling with it for an hour or so the first time, but I simply don't have the time now. Thankfully, the hotel has a service called "Wayport" that offers what looks like DSL service for $9.95 a day. Considering I probably spend about that much connecting for a couple of hours to Netcom's 800 number - and considering my modem doesn't work - it's probably a bargain. (I might even be able to snag a couple of large files in the bargain, for example, the Quicktime graphics tutorials suggested by

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Sometimes it's hard to stay positive...

The networking session this afternoon was one of those gatherings where there are entirely too many people in the room, and everyone is trying to speak at the same time, so everyone eventually ends up yelling. Plus there's not really enough time to get any significant networking done, which was the whole purpose of the event. Jeez.

Then the annual dinner of the Slavic Languages Division turns out to be somewhat underwhelming. Don't misunderstand. The people who organized it really worked hard, and I'm happy to have spent some time with such talented company. It's just that the dinner fell far short of what I expect to receive when I fork over $44 for a meal (plus over $10 for one cocktail). To add insult to injury, our group was seated outside on a kind of patio. In the heat. AAaaarrrgghhh!

There was nothing particularly special about the meal. The salad was fairly standard, except for the goat cheese spread on the toasted bread that came on the side, together with the usual assortment of greens. Among the choices of main course there was rotisserie chicken, penne with eggplant, a tuna "burger," and spaghetti in a sauce made of sun-dried tomato, basil, and garlic. I had the tuna, and yes, it was a burger, and yes, it came with a bunch of McDonald's style french fries. (How well I am getting to know those fries!) Dessert was a sherbert parfait-looking thing.

All in all, despite my moaning and groaning, things are going pretty nominally. I'll have to remember to check tomorrow to see whether I can extend here for a day. The front desk told me when I checked in that there were no rooms available for me to stay until Sunday. We'll see.

Cheers...