Back in the USSR

OK, not really. I’m back in Monterey, and back in the wonderful world of library conferences, but the crossover portion of that Venn diagram is pretty awesome, and far from a centrally controlled totalitarian regime.

For now.

Flew in to Oakland on Wednesday, spent some time with some college friends, and then Nina and I set out for Yosemite. Which was unbelievably gorgeous, though it did set off of my vertigo on more than one occasion.  After several days, we trekked back out to Monterey, and found the Aquarium there to be as awesome as ever. More so, even, as it now includes several exhibits discussion issues such as climate change and the true cost of the seafood industry, all of which were admirably honest, surprisingly optimistic, and full of instruction on how guests could go home and get involved in making social change. (And more than a few bits that didn’t even require them to go home. Awesome.)

And then it was time for rocking out with my peers. This year saw Beatles RockBand make an appearance, to the joy of all involved. (It may also have something to do with the title of this post, and you don’t know how lucky you are, boy.  Girl. Person.) It’s really fun teaching folks how to play that game, and the fact that damn near everyone knows Beatles songs makes it even more fun. My kind of instruction interview.

I also got to chat for a while with Scott Nicholson, one of my favorite profs from library school and someone who’s doing awesome things with game design as teaching tool. I’ve got to post more about that, but I’m forced to wonder if this is the right blog for it. Thank Thoth-Hermes for cross-posting.

So far IL2010 is a mix of the familiar and the exotic for me. Looking forward to tomorrow.

CiL 2010: Day 0

I have once again arrived in Arlington for Computers in Libraries. So far I’ve bumped into several people I met last year and have met even more folks (including the very neat crew I went to dinner with, whose twitter handles I hope I will remember). Thanks again to Amy for introducing me around, and Jenica for making sure my allergy-blighted eyes didn’t cause me to walk into traffic on the way back from the pub. I’m looking forward to seeing more folks whom I haven’t run into yet, and catching up with the people whom I’ve only managed to see in passing today.

I also got to rock out, this year with “Hungry Like The Wolf” and “Alex Chilton”… though I think the kickass rendition of “You Outta Know” might’ve stolen the petting zoo. (No, it’s not a mixed metaphor, dammit.)

Now to bed, to try to get some sleep before presenting tomorrow.