Louisville - Day 2

Despite the dreary, rainy beginning, the day went pretty well today. My alarm woke me up this morning at 7:30 - at which point I realized that my hotel clock was an hour behind! (It still said 6:30).  Made my way to the Convention Center by 9 - the one late day of the week. One of the highlights of my day was when I was unearthing our credit card machine (which Linda and I expertly hit beneath a pile of "ITEACH Green" buttons.) I opened the box and what was sitting on the top of the pile of buttons? My lost glasses! (see photo).

It's a LONG walk from the hotel to the CC - though a little better if you know the "shortcuts." And I don't recommend going via Steve and Linda's route - they swear they saw a dead body at the bottom of one of the escalators. We spent some time doing some last-minute rearranging and then, all too soon, it was time to open. 

No conference would be complete with the requisite "Ron sniffing." This year was

no exception and Lauren Olsen, Joan Haas, and Terri Rust were happy to step in to make sure Ron was properly smelled. Needless to say, Ron's face was completely BEET red.

Time went quickly and soon it was time to send Steve and Linda off to eat lunch. Naturally, as soon as they left, things picked up and Ron and I were plenty busy. Ron wrote up an order for over $55o! When Steve and Linda returned, Ron and I headed off to the Wolfgang Puck Express (REALLY good food) but I

 had to wolf it down to get back

 and head over to the Marriott with Steve be

fore a 1:30 meeting.

The afternoon was fairly uneventful. I got a kick out of meeting "Terps 

guy" and "Frostburg guy." (see pics.) Terps guy had on both a Terps jacket AND a Terps shirt! The piece de resistance was when he pulled out his Baltimore Ravens credit card to pay for his purchase! I told him that he and my husband must have been separated at birth. 

Another highlight of the afternoon was trying to officiate Steve and Linda's (apparently) ongoing disagreement about whether or not Linda had to give up making Christmas cookies with her mother and daughter in order to show up for her wedding with Steve. 

In my rush to get

 back to the hotel in time for the 5:15 New Member Reception, I somehow managed to leave the Resource Booth's petty cash in the cash box - back in the Convention Center. Doi! I didn't realize it until I got back to my room and double checked.

After dinner, Lari, Tamara, Mo, and Brian came up to my room t

o watch American Idol. They got tired of listening to me angsting about the petty cash and finally, at about 9:00, I took Brian up on his offer to walk back over to the CC to look for it. EXCEPT that I insisted on running the entire way. Let me tell you, it's a LONG way - a solid five minutes of running and I thought I would pass out. The fun

niest part is that we just wandered into the CC and not one person challenged us - including the paid guard who was standing OUTSIDE the CC when we walked in. He eventually noticed us, but paid us no attention after Brian WAVED to him. I dug inside my boxes, found the cash box and (thankfully) found my $200 in petty cash. Phew! 

Let's hope I'm a little less scatterbrained tomorrow.