Going In...

Got up and made it to the continental breakfast in time to pick through some rather rotted bananas and instead settle for coffee, and some bagelish thing. Off to the UPS store to print the thing out. I was driving even more grandfatherly than usual. A, it is raining and B, the nice lady at the car checkout counter really put the hard sell on me to get the insurance. Three times she rattled off a list of things from which it would protect me and each time she slowed down, leered and put heavy emphasis on “vandals.” She knew I was going to Hilton Head and I supposed that she was warning me of 9-iron wielding seniors all hopped up on Geritol n’ Juice. As it happened, no vandals have attacked me yet, but I will remain vigilant.

Also, as traditional, I got hopelessly lost on the way to the conference venue. I made the same horrible mistake I made last night, I trusted in mapquest directions. Compare these directions (from Savannah to the hotel) from mapquest with the quite simple directions I found on the conference site:

And then these leading me from the hotel to the conference:

What the Hell is mapquest smoking?

I got in and dropped 80 bucks on the conference and another 75 on two books on Korean economic history that I will read on the plane (or in the airport, since the Atlanta Airport is currently experiencing 4 hour delays) and by the time I return to Big City I will be an ultra-expert!

I’m in the presentation room, making sure everything works and timing my presentation.. looks to be good for 18-20 minutes which is right in the cabin. Everyone else is upstairs eating, but I never eat before a presentation for fear it might turn into a warm and cozy nap. Unaccountably this ultra-expensive hotel does not have wireless, so I am hopelessly trapped, trapped I tell you, in this air-conditioned room watching the rain and wind lash the palm fronds. A perfect time to start drinking adult-beverages based on rum, but that would lead to a presentation failure of an entirely different sort.