ALA "Pre-conference" experiences
My conference started at 4:00am EST (time zones are important) when I woke up in State College, PA. By 5:00am I was at University Park Airport (SCE) and found half a dozen fellow Penn State librarians flying as well. By 6:00am we had cleared security (one seating area, like 3 gates) when they announced "mechanical failure" (what the late George Carlin referred to as "broken plane") which required a mechanic that was 45 minutes away. We waited and got free breakfast, I made some back up flights, but they told us another plane was rerouted (since there are a total of 9 flights out of SCE daily) by 9:30am.

Eventually both flights were canceled and they put some of us in a taxi (van) to Harrisburg Airport (MDT) just about a 2 hour drive.  There was free internet there and I got to enjoy an early lunch while waiting for the flight.  From there to Atlanta (ATL), which makes any flyer nervous, but where I was assured of a FIRST CLASS seat.  So I got to the next departure gate and the standby list is over 30 people, many looking pissed off, so I was very lucky to be on the plane.  We boarded and immediately I was treated to a Leinenkugel Summer Wheat!  I won't go into the other amenities I experienced apart from the "plebeian" coach classes, except the entertainment touch screen in front of me which had movies, tv, and Bookworm.  Bookworm is a word game and I thought it would be appropriate to play on the way to a library professional conference.  The results:



I achieved the rank of Senior Librarian (I passed by Assistant Librarian without even a tenure review!)  As a guybrarian I must protest the obvious gender bias in almost all the game's images.  Heh.

Finally my brother picked me up at LAX, which is a feat I thank him for, since I was originally flying into John Wayne (SNA) Airport about 10 minutes from his house.  We went to the Yard House for some beer and second dinner, which was pretty good but expensive.