MLA Day One

(A few quick items before I head out for lunch)

1. Conference terrorism:

I believe I coined this term last year to describe those aggressively bad papers that hold an entire room hostage while they're being delivered. But last night I saw a slightly different form of terrorism during the one panel I attended: during the Q&A a kindly-looking grey-haired man in the audience attacked every single member of the panel (two of whom were graduate students, one a second-year assistant professor) with very long, very hostile criticisms that weren't really questions. The panelists did an impressive job of parrying, but it was a deeply uncomfortable-making experience. (In part because I kept thinking: "please, please, please, Sir, do not come to my panel.")

2. The weirdly club-y lighting of the Hyatt reception desk/bar/atrium:

The main lobby gets very dark here at night, with groovy (?) lighting, and I keep thinking I see people I know. On the one hand, the dark lighting makes it possible to avoid those I really don't want to see. On the other hand, it makes it hard for me to be certain whether the people I don't want to see are, in fact, the people I've seen--and thus whether I have to continue to be on guard.

3. Blogger meet-up:

I'm not going to attempt to enumerate the nearly 20 bloggers I met or re-met last night, but it was an excellent gathering and an amazing time--and one that just went on and on and ON, until the last of us were kicked out when the bar closed. I'm afraid to look at the receipts in my wallet and discover exactly how much I spent.

But! No bad dreams and no back problems so far. Stay tuned~~