We've been in Detroit since Thursday and I have seen some good sessions and some not so good sessions. But that's about par for the course, right? What I have been disappointed in is the attendance. There are a lot of folks who just didn't show even though they were accepted and some who never even thought about coming. I'm pretty sure that attendance is so low because it's in Detroit. Folks are afraid of Detroit. I don't know if they are afraid of the rumors or frightened by the thought of a true chocolate city. Afraid of being outnumbered the way us Black academic folk are at all of our professional meetings, in our departments, and many times in our own towns. To those folks I just say get over yourselves, your closed mindedness caused you to miss one of the greatest cities in the United States.
We are already hearing rumors of folks being "concerned" for their safety in New Orleans at Cs next year. To those folks I say again Get. The. Fuck. Over. It. Don't let your ignorance make you miss out on another of the great cities in the U.S. (ironically another chocolate city). NOLA (and Detroit) are no more dangerous that any large city in the U.S. They may be a little darker (and you know what I mean) than you are used to, but they are no more dangerous.
Ok, enough of my ranting. I'm going to bed. I'll put my notes up soon.
I was going to take some time to blog about the conference and tell a funy story about trying to get a flight out of NYC, but it's not funny any more so I don't even want to talk about the conference right now.
In a nutshell I went to the Delta website this morning to do online check in and found out that our later flight out of NYC had been cancelled and that they had moved us to a noon flight (nope, nobody told us). The noon flight was then delayed until 2:20 then 2:30 now 3:08. We are really starting to wonder if we are ever going to get out of here. That may be a negative. I just paid 8 bucks for wireless access to keep me entertained because I packed my ipod in my checked luggage and Lisa didn't (yep, that means that she is in her own little world).
We did have our SnB on Wednesday and I'll post pictures when I get them off of the camera. Unfortunately my own session was about the only one that I went to because I am on Executive committee and that means I give my life to meetings at the national conferences for the next three years. Hey, I'll do what it takes to do some good.
I was also re-elected co-chair of queer caucus, but I think that was because no one else wanted the job. I am actually excited about that because now I'll get to do some CMS stuff for the caucus.
Ok, I am writing more than I meant to because I really just wanted to sulk, check email, and read other peoples' blogs!
I finally made it to Lubbock. After being delayed 1/2 hour, sitting on a tarmac for an hour, running from one gate to another only to find that my connecting flight was also delayed an hour...I finally made it to Lubbock. Had a nice chat with Danielle on the cab ride in (of course there was no shuttle since we were an hour and a half late and we didn't feel like waiting for it to come back if we called), had to explain (nicely) to the young man at the check in desk that I would not be sleeping without linen and showering without a towel, waited for said young man's boss to wake up and come down and find me the requested linens. Got to my room and yes, it does look like every other dorm room in the US. And because I had to fit in I promptly threw my stuff around and ordered a pizza. Mmmmmmmmm....college life.
I have no idea wether anybody podcasted the panel, but it was pretty clear that we all agreed on three basic truths of blogging in the tri-state area:
(1) We're hitting insiders and wonks. We have not even scratched the surface of the local media market.
(2) Open source community platforms rule, but CivicSpace/Drupal beats Soapblox's ass 4:1.
(3) Last but not least, as I was wanton to say all throughout the conference, if there is one distinction to be made between bloggers and journalists is that we are not there to break stories like investigative reporters would do. Our brand of blogging is of activist Op/Ed writers with a simple mission : Deconstruct the news and expose the truth or lies beneath the media-speak.
Which takes me to the moral of the (conference's) story :
and I was found guilty. My punishment? Yep, I got my finger slammed in the car door in Houghton. For that reason I only have a few papers noted right now. Wanna see the picture?
This is really slowing down both my work and my knitting! It's kinda hard to tell from the picture, but the tip is purple and the finger is about twice the normal size!
