The (As-Usual) Surreal Con Experience

Trying to describe what happens at a blog conference is always so hard. There are so many moments that are touching, strange, funny, frustrating, and inspiring, but they’re all jumbled together and generally are better in person than on screen. It doesn’t matter the conference – all of them share certain aspects. So I’ll try to describe Blissdom without rambling too much about great moments that you’ll read and just scratch your head, asking “What’s the big deal?”

I wanted to do a post yesterday, but spent most of the day staring at this:

Yeah, see, I told you all blog cons have things in common. This isn’t the first time I’ve encountered hotels that didn’t realize that a conference full of bloggers really will need internet access for nearly everyone.

Thankfully the hotel did get more wifi access.

Dinner last night was at the hotel, and featured the Incredibly Enormous Salad:

In true southern cooking fashion, asking for a little mayo for my sandwich resulted in enough mayo to make a potato salad for 10.

This morning, we were treated to a sneak peak at the new Yanni DVD Voices. Everyone danced in their seats to the Latin-flavored music and drooled over the guy on the DVD I affectionately named “Frilly ponytail matador vam-pirate guy” – you have to see the DVD to understand. But then, just as we all came down from our salsa-dancing high, we shot back up again when they announced that two of the singers from Voices were here to answer questions. And yes, one of them was “Frilly ponytail matador vam-pirate guy”. After the Q&A, autographs and photo ops were provided.

The sessions today were packed with more information than I can share in one post, so I’ll have to come back to them later.

Chris Mann provided late-afternoon entertainment with his excellent music. Gotta love a musician who is also Twitter-savvy.

Dinner was at the most amazing restaurant in Nashville. The New Orleans Mansion House is a beautiful, elegant old mansion, but the staff were funny and extremely accommodating, and they knew how to actually make a real drink. (Sorry, the hotel drinks were little more than juice and water.) The food? Incredible.

The evening had to end with a bang, and if it wasn’t going to be drunken antics, how about a group of bloggers stuck in a hotel elevator for 40 minutes? I just got word they were freed minutes ago. Had Baby Jessica fallen down the well with a smart phone and Twitter in the 80’s, she would have been rescued a lot faster, I think.

Finally, I have to add that the hit of the weekend seems to have been my new itty-bitty Dell Mini. It’s a 9″ laptop with only the stuff you need for a conference, and it’s so lightweight. I wish I was getting commission for all of the Dell Minis that will be purchased from the Dell Outlet this week – I’m sure a few will be finding new homes with these bloggers.

Small-fry

PS – All photos provided by a spiffy Canon Rebel XT that was on-loan to me from Midwest Photo Exchange. They’re a Columbus company owned by a great guy who is practically family. I’m sad to have to return this camera, but I’m still saving to buy another from him soon. (He rents cameras, too.)