As you may or may not know, I am a trip planner (Don't Stop Now showcases some of my roadtrip-planning prowess). I recently wrote about how I intend to go to the American Library Association's Annual conference in Anaheim this summer. Now I am booking our plane flights, and I'm having trouble figuring out which self makes the final decision on dates: Is it the librarian self who should get maximum ALA time, but maybe doesn't need to right now since I'm not even working as a librarian? Is it the author self who should get maximum possible hanging out in an authorly way time (I don't even know what that means)? Or is it the mom/Disneyland obsessor who wants the max Disney time? I cannot even pretend the first two will win out. The conundrum is this: arrive on Wednesday and leave on Monday OR arrive on Thursday and leave on Tuesday. What's the diff, you ask? Well, if we book the first plan, that will give us one and a half days of less busy Disneyland time before the ALA conference (Disney's least busy days are Tuesday-Thursday). But that will also mean leaving Monday morning and, thus, possibly missing out on ALA stuff and definitely missing the Printz award ceremony. Going with the second choice would mean only having a half day of less busy Disney time and butting right up to the conference on both ends (did that sound pervy?). I seriously have been banging my head about this all weekend (perhaps that's the Slayer I'm listening to), but this is how I plan trips. I weigh everything. It's one of my absolute greatest pleasures in life. I actually researched in books and online to see if I could come up with the specific number of guests per day of the week, and while I didn't have enough research time to find the answers I think I already know what I must do. The fact is, even though I am reading a couple of the Printz winners right now and loving them, I don't think I will up for going to the ceremony on my final night of Disneyland anyway (if I chose the second schedule). We will be on central time, I will be Disney tired, and there will probably be one more character meal to squeeze in. So, thank you, blog readers, for helping me figure out what I'm going to do! Now where did I put those mouse ears...
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3 comments:
As great as conferences are, I always try to book conferences based on what else I can do while I'm there. I wanted to go to ALA (or maybe it was midwinter) when it was in San Diego because that meant I would get lots of time to visit my brother. I ended up not going at all, but sadly, to me it's not worth going to a big conference like that unless I get to do something else while I'm there since my library doesn't pay for the full travel and hotel stay.
So I say maximize your Disney time. Hopefully that does not make me a bad librarian.
I'm all about maximizing your Disney time. But you knew I'd say that. So, do your time in this order:
Disney
author
library
ER, it's very expensive to go to conferences! My first ALA was through a B&T grant, and after that I started going when I was on the YALSA Selected Audiobooks committee- my school paid for those. And lucky for me, I live near Chicago, and ALA is there every few years. Plus, as an author it's now a tax write-off. So that doesn't make you a bad librarian at all! And Ronni, I was loving all your Disney pictures! I totally agree with your order.
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