This is the part where I get to tell you about my honorary Master's degree. but not yet.
First to the swag. The book that GreenBeanTeenQueen got was called Glow, but I am not sure of the author. I received a free audiobook copy of the latest Wheel of Time book called Towers of Midnight. On the last day of the conference most display items are for sale or are even given away free so I made the most of that time too. I got the whole set of the Ranger's apprentice books, I got a hard cover edition of The Ring of Solomon the final book in the Bartimaeus series, I got the hard cover graphic novels of The Amulet of Samarkand and the Lightning Thief. So I was pretty happy. Wife got a lot more we wound up shipping or packing over 200 lbs of books for her teens at the library.
As for the rest of the trip, it was fun but rather uneventful until we went to a meetup with some of GreenBeanTeenQueen's blogger/librarian friends. We had dinner a couple times and walked around San Diego, until they decided that they were going to start their own library called The International Library of Awesome or ILOA for short. I was feeling a little left out since I was the only one who was not technically a librarian due to the fact that I do not have a Master's in Library Science. They solved that problem for me by granting me an Honorary Master's of Information and Library Science.
They also came up with an idea that will be a new segment on the blog. Once a month you will get to watch a video blog entitled P&G. This stands for Puke and Glitter, I will coordinate with another ILOA member to read the same YA book and give it a review on a one to five scale of buckets of puke if I did not like it, and buckets of glitter if I did like it. The book choices will generally be books that we expect will elicit a puke response from me and a glitter response from my co-host that month. However, you never know when I might give out some glitter (it will be manly glitter though, like blue glitter or camo colored or something.) So watch for that.
I guess that is it. Starting tomorrow I am going to try to finish the second half of NaNoWriMo. So I will post back with updates and you will see how I progress...
Showing posts with label ALAMW11. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ALAMW11. Show all posts
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Midwinter Institute Gushing part 1 #alamw11
WARNING! Major gushing to follow.
Sorry it has been so long, but I hope to make up for it this week with my updates from the American Library Association's Midwinter Institute from sunny San Diego California.
GreenBeanTeenQueen and I arrived Wednesday night and made our way to our fabulous hotel - The Gaslamp Hilton and our room has a wonderful view of the convention center and the bay behind. We have been treated to beautiful sunsets and gorgeous mid 60s weather.
Thursday we woke up and made our way to the San Diego Zoo which was even better than advertised. I grew up going to the Brookfield Zoo which is considered the third best zoo in the United States, but I can fully understand why San Diego is number one. The landscape was beautiful, and I saw animals there that I did not know even existed. It was so much fun, I highly recommend it.
Then we went to the San Diego Maritime Museum and got to go on several ships. First we went on a 1874 merchant ship, then we went on a replica of a pre-civil war era warship, we went on a retired soviet submarine from 1974, then a retired American submarine from 1968. We also went on a steam liner from circa 1870. It was incredible to see all the craftsmanship and we got some great pictures that I will post later.
We closed our evening walking around the beautiful gaslamp district.
Yesterday we woke up and did all of our registration for ALA. Then we went to lunch at the wonderful Yard House. It was amazing, a lot of bar food, but it was bar food the way that a culinary school would do it. So good! Wifey got 3 cheese grilled cheese with tomato bisque soup and I got Parmesan crusted chicken with garlic mashed potatoes and 3 mushroom sauce.
After lunch wifey had a committee meeting so I wandered over to Petco Park where the San Diego Padres play. They have a beautiful stadium and you can walk all the way up to the outfield fence to take pictures of the field.
After wifey's committee meeting, we got to go to the opening of the exhibits. It was awesome, we ran into some friends, and then when the doors opened rushed to get all of the freebees. Within 11 minutes I was heading back to the hotel with bags bulging. After 3 additional hotel runs we went to the Yalsa Not so Silent Silent Auction. It was fun but a bit to rich for us so we left early for our YA Librarian/Blogger meetup. When we got there we found that a publisher had come and comped us drinks up to $500. We had a couple authors and many blogging librarians, it was an absolute blast. The publisher who came had worked for Tor and for Random House before moving to Baen, so I was his shadow for a lot of the night learning all that I could about those publishers. He also recommended a epic fantasy series by Steven Erikson which I am very excited to read. Eventually as the meetup slowed down we went back to the room, ordered room service, and went to bed.
Today has been amazing. We got up and went over to the convention center, and we got tweeted that Macmillan wanted to meet with us. We went over to the booth and found that that the amazing library marketing team had seen my tweets. I had tweeted about how upset I was that neither Tor nor Wizards of the Coast had come to midwinter institute. I had also tweeted how I was carry bags for GreenBeanTeenQueen and that I could use encouragement should anyone see me weighed down with books. Turns out that they had a surprise for each of us. For wifey, they had an ARC of a book that will not be published for more than a year to do a special review on. For me, they had a free audiobook from Tor! I can't give titles until after the conference so come back and I will tell all.
This totally made my day and gave me a whole new respect for Macmillan. I am so grateful for the gift and I promptly tweeted Macmillan's praises.
Now, I am off to lunch, and wifey is in committee today so I think I will take in some NFL playoff football. I would love to hear your thoughts.
Sorry it has been so long, but I hope to make up for it this week with my updates from the American Library Association's Midwinter Institute from sunny San Diego California.
GreenBeanTeenQueen and I arrived Wednesday night and made our way to our fabulous hotel - The Gaslamp Hilton and our room has a wonderful view of the convention center and the bay behind. We have been treated to beautiful sunsets and gorgeous mid 60s weather.
Thursday we woke up and made our way to the San Diego Zoo which was even better than advertised. I grew up going to the Brookfield Zoo which is considered the third best zoo in the United States, but I can fully understand why San Diego is number one. The landscape was beautiful, and I saw animals there that I did not know even existed. It was so much fun, I highly recommend it.
Then we went to the San Diego Maritime Museum and got to go on several ships. First we went on a 1874 merchant ship, then we went on a replica of a pre-civil war era warship, we went on a retired soviet submarine from 1974, then a retired American submarine from 1968. We also went on a steam liner from circa 1870. It was incredible to see all the craftsmanship and we got some great pictures that I will post later.
We closed our evening walking around the beautiful gaslamp district.
Yesterday we woke up and did all of our registration for ALA. Then we went to lunch at the wonderful Yard House. It was amazing, a lot of bar food, but it was bar food the way that a culinary school would do it. So good! Wifey got 3 cheese grilled cheese with tomato bisque soup and I got Parmesan crusted chicken with garlic mashed potatoes and 3 mushroom sauce.
After lunch wifey had a committee meeting so I wandered over to Petco Park where the San Diego Padres play. They have a beautiful stadium and you can walk all the way up to the outfield fence to take pictures of the field.
After wifey's committee meeting, we got to go to the opening of the exhibits. It was awesome, we ran into some friends, and then when the doors opened rushed to get all of the freebees. Within 11 minutes I was heading back to the hotel with bags bulging. After 3 additional hotel runs we went to the Yalsa Not so Silent Silent Auction. It was fun but a bit to rich for us so we left early for our YA Librarian/Blogger meetup. When we got there we found that a publisher had come and comped us drinks up to $500. We had a couple authors and many blogging librarians, it was an absolute blast. The publisher who came had worked for Tor and for Random House before moving to Baen, so I was his shadow for a lot of the night learning all that I could about those publishers. He also recommended a epic fantasy series by Steven Erikson which I am very excited to read. Eventually as the meetup slowed down we went back to the room, ordered room service, and went to bed.
Today has been amazing. We got up and went over to the convention center, and we got tweeted that Macmillan wanted to meet with us. We went over to the booth and found that that the amazing library marketing team had seen my tweets. I had tweeted about how upset I was that neither Tor nor Wizards of the Coast had come to midwinter institute. I had also tweeted how I was carry bags for GreenBeanTeenQueen and that I could use encouragement should anyone see me weighed down with books. Turns out that they had a surprise for each of us. For wifey, they had an ARC of a book that will not be published for more than a year to do a special review on. For me, they had a free audiobook from Tor! I can't give titles until after the conference so come back and I will tell all.
This totally made my day and gave me a whole new respect for Macmillan. I am so grateful for the gift and I promptly tweeted Macmillan's praises.
Now, I am off to lunch, and wifey is in committee today so I think I will take in some NFL playoff football. I would love to hear your thoughts.
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