26th Apr 2003
Some Conference Survival Tips
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I learned a lot at Etech this last week, and will write a bit about it… soon. |
- Yes, you will need your power cord. I know your laptop has batteries. I know what the manufacturer told you.
(psst… c’mhere…. they are lying to you! your laptop has a power-strip sensor.. the closer you are to a power strip, the faster the battery will die.
It’s that simple) - If you are over, say, 15, don’t drink 3 cups of coffee in the morning, and expect to make it through a couple of back to back sessions. The only part of your body that appreciates coffee is from your tongue on up to the top of your skull. The rest of your body just wants it out, right now.
- Bring a laptop you can actually use on your lap. I hate my laptop. It has one of those “pointing sticks” between the keys. You know.. you just look at it and the cursor goes flying over to your neighbors screen, and you have to sheepishly ask for it back. Touchpads are de rigeur. The keyboard is bouncy, so I’m never sure if I’ll get 0, 1, 2, or 3 characters for each keystroke. Oh, and if it took any longer to boot up, the only sound in the meeting room would be nighttime crickets.
- There is the hopefulness of penciling in every single session you want to go to, and then there’s the reality of meeting overload. The warning sign is a buzzing feeling in one’s head. I call it “conference blur”… the sensation that you’ve been to a session, but you can’t remember if it was on Thursday morning, Wednesday after lunch, Tuesday night, or perhaps it was a long entry you read in a blog somewhere. It could have been a ReallyLongWikiLink, for all you know.
- You want to see three really interesting talks, but they’re all at the same time…
- … and this happens every day of the conference.
- … and this happens at every conference, because if it didn’t, every conference would be a month long.
- You get home, and can’t wait to go to the next one.
