Orange County - East

Here I am, putting my post-conference day achy feet up (smelly, achy feet - ick! no socks worn today), writing for whomever it is that reads here. I got a pedometer in my conference package and so far I've walked 6.5 km. Far less than I should have - as I was intending on walking to the congress centre, but realized it's at least 1.5 km's to the end of the drive of our hotel/resort. Then maybe 2-3 km's to the facility. So instead I take the shuttle with everyone else. What's new today? Well, second conference in two weeks - I'm just about lectured and exhibited out. The US conferences are so different from those at home. Firstly, they are 100x larger - everything is bigger... booths, congress centres (this one is one million square feet and that's no exaggeration - obviously the conference doesn't occupy the whole space), lectures, numbers of delegates, etc. All the rules are different here too. My time spent at the booth is quite useless because I'm not allowed to dispense my ever growing knowledge. Not here. That's not allowed. So I just look cute and speak French with all of the people here from Marseilles, Lyon, Paris, and Switzerland (today's list of French-speaking foreign delegates). The US reps think it's great that myself and the Quebec rep can do this so, even when the person can speak English, they send them our way. It's funny how I seem to be speaking French so much more these days. And in places I wouldn't have normally thought it would happen - US conferences and Panama (last spring) for example. It's great! I've also been speaking French with my Quebec counterpart most of the time here - it's really fun to talk and know that 98% of the people around us cannot understand. He, he! So many things I could write tonight, but I'm fading fast and need my sleep. Perhaps I'll have more to put down at another time.