So, here I am in beautiful Chicago for the ALA 2013 Conference! This year I will attempt once again to give a play by play of all the activities I take part in during the conference. I've already had a big day, so here goes!
Started out my conference experience by riding up to Chicago with two librarian friends and what did we talk about most of the way up? Libraries, of course. Particularly ideas for how to make our state-wide youth conference amazing. Once we got to the Windy City it was a quick stop to drop my bags off and get checked in at the hotel, then I was off to the convention center! But first I had to get there. Last year, my hotel was about one mile from the main convention center. This year, it's more like five. So, even thought I love my running, a five mile run is not exactly how I was anticipating getting around. Luckily, ALA provides a free shuttle service to get us all carted around the city. Unluckily, my first shuttle whizzed past me without so much as a how do you do. So, I had to wait for almost an hour to even get to the convention center! Of course, I spent that time meeting some librarians who are staying at or near my hotel. Who can say networking! Shuttle arrived, and I was off to get pick up my registration materials.
After checking in at registration I high-tailed it my first meeting...I sat in on the 2014 PLA planning meeting since it will be in Indianapolis and I now represent the State Library. I can't divulge anything about that meeting because I was sworn to secrecy. But I was treated very kindly by all who were there. And that's all I can say about that. I will add that I took notes on my iPad using Evernote. See how relevant I am?
Next stop, the first Keynote of the conference. Steven D. Levitt of Freakonomics fame kicked off the conference telling us a bit about how he got into talking about Freakonomics and a few of his freaky ways of thinking about problems. I had already heard about his premise that the crime rate went down in the 1990's because of legalized abortions in the 1970's, so that wasn't a surprise to me. I was surprised that apparently global warming can be fixed by putting chemicals up into the atmosphere to create more clouds. Uh huh.
The vendor hall opened after that. Oh sweet free books. Getting in right when the vendor hall opens is an honest to goodness cluster activity. Then it's a constant press to pick up the piles and piles of freebies from all the many vendors. I barely scratched the surface of the hall and only hit the major kid publishers, but I still ended up with a Wonder Woman tote bag, dozens of free books, and two interviews with Sammy! Sammy got to speak with Tanya Lee Stone, author of many books including Elizabeth Leads the Way: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the Right to Vote, AND Ken Setterington, author of Mom and Mum are Getting Married and his newest, Branded by the Pink Triangle. Ah, Sammy makes life good.
By then, my librarian friends and I were getting very famished. We started our walk to our last destination, grabbing a quick dinner at Panera on the way, and arrived at the Sheraton for the session titled: “Bleak New World: YA Authors Decode Dystopia." And YA authors there were. The panel was made up of YA stars Veronica Roth, Patrick Ness, Cory Doctorow, and the one and only Lois Lowry.
Wow. I was in the same room as Lois Lowry.
I didn't actually get to hear Lois' opening remarks, which was disappointing, but I did get to hear her answer some questions and I also totally felt one with Veronica Roth when she mentioned reading a lot of Lois Lowry as a young adult. Hearing authors speak is fascinating, especially hearing them react to their readers during the Q and A segments.
Then came the big amazing moment of the evening. Sammy got to interview Cory Doctorow. Yep. That really happened. All in all? Great first day.
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