Highlights from San Diego

A HUGE benefit of attending ALA in San Diego was getting to visit my friend who also was kind enough to host me and act as my tour guide. And an evening walk on the beach was lovely.

We also visited Cabrillo National Monument. We took a few minutes to visit the ocean.

Oh, and take pictures of some plants I haven't seen in a very, very, very long time.

A selfie with Rodrigues Cabrillo and the off to the airport to fly home.

It was great and definitely worth another trip.

Highlights from ALA in San Diego

I have to say that I have enjoyed all of the ALA Annual Conferences that I have attended. BUT San Diego is by far my favorite location for this conference. After chatting about different people about San Diego, I was tempted to play hooky the whole time and enjoy all the city has to offer. In the end, I did attend much of the conference but was lucky to have a friend who lives there and was kind enough to be my guide.

The event that kicked off the conference for me was the keynote which featured the amazing Trevor Noah. My friend and spent the entire session sitting on the floor as the room had moved passed standing room only to sitting room only well before it started. Trevor has written a children's book and while that seems to be a fad for the famous, after listening to him talk about the book, his motivation, and his creative process, I am totally sold. 

At the end of the interview/speech I jumped up to take a few pictures incase any one says "pics or it didn't happen". Amusingly, the ALA logo here seems to be a halo around Trevor's head.  

While I wasn't presenting with the LTI Lab this time, I was interested in checking out the tech they brought to the conference. This time, in addition to the MQ2 and the Vision Pro, they brought robots. This one is the Guidebot and you can customize the background on the screen and the eyes. Which is what I did before we took a picture together.

I also had the opportunity to meet my e-portfolio advisor in person. The advisors are randomly assigned so I hadn't taken any courses from her, but she was marvelous and I was fortunate to work with her.

More robots! Meet Pepper. I didn't get the chance to interact much with her, but later in the conference when the exhibit hall was much calmer I caught her slowly turning her head to watch a group of us who were talking. Not just a little creepy.

I was late to the game to sign up for presenting a poster at the SJSU Reception, so my poster partner and I got a slot to present in the virtual poster presentation space. No one showed up, but it's another line on my resume/CV.

The reception was also an opportunity to meet up with some of the fabulous UX Student Group folks that I worked with this last year. I really enjoyed working with these intensely creative and dedicated people!

Back at the exhibit hall, I found the Elvis impersonator with whom I took a picture last year and he was kind enough to pose for a repeat.

And the last robot of the conference is the little NAO. I put my hand on its head to take a picture and then discovered that the robot giggles when you do that. Definitely an engaging robot for kids who can learn how to write code for this robot as an introduction to coding.

I will cover the lovely city of San Diego in another post. The conference was another great and exhausting experience. Sadly, my conference days may be over since I have been fortunate enough to have all of my adventures funded by the iSchool. 

Michael went to Europe

 I can't say much because I wasn't there, but I wanted to share some pictures of his trip here. He flew to Germany (by himself!) and spent 10 days with Aunt Rachel and Nana in Germany and France. Interestingly, he now thinks that French people are nicer than German people.

And at the end of it all, he brought back covid-19 and NO CHOCOLATE.

Guess he'll have to go back again some time.

Germany Day 6

WIESBADEN - FRANKFURT - PORTLAND - SEATTLE 

All good things must end. So on Friday we got back onto a plane and flew back to the PNW. 

This time the inflight entertainment system let us know where we were during the flight. So even though it was "nighttime" on the plane, we lifted the window shade a little bit and snuck a peek at Greenland.

And then we were home. Well, close to home. Landed in Portland where Doug and Mom kindly drove us home. Ben and I were all kinds of exhausted but had lots of goodies (and a stuffie for Isaac) to distribute. Rachel was an amazing hostess and we had a great time on our quick trip to Germany. We're excited for when she gets back to the States and we can see her more often.

Day One

Day Two

Day Three

Day Four

Day Five

Germany Day 5

COLOGNE - HOHENZOLLERN BRIDGE - COLOGNE CATHEDRAL - GROSS ST. MARTIN - CHOCOLATE MUSEUM - WIESBADEN 

Another day in Germany, another day of walking! We started off the morning with breakfast at café along the Rhein River (can't say that every day). Ben got his morning hit of Nutella and we went off to the Hohenzollern Bridge to check out the locks and the view of the Cologne Cathedral before going right to the cathedral.

Not a bad view.

After I had fulfilled my need for "pics or it didn't happen" we walked over to the cathedral itself.

Wow. Just wow. It is unbelievable. I could barely fit it the entirety of the front within the picture on my phone. And it made me dizzy to look all the way up to the top. The cathedral took 14 hits from aerial bombing in WWII and it is still here. 

It turns out that this particular morning was the Feast of the Ascension and there was a special mass underway when we went it. We weren't able to explore the whole building, but it was still an incredible experience. Also, imagine if this was your local church you attended for services!

Once again, Ben found hanging out in a church a little awkward and this one was quite crowded, so we headed back outside and found another church (Great St. Martin) where he could feel uncomfortable without an audience.

Then we took pity on him and walked over to the Chocolate Museum. The guide told us it would take us between 60-90 minute to go through the museum. We said, "Challenge accepted!" and were there for at least 2 hours.

They even had a little rainforest room where we had flashbacks from Virginia summers. 

It was very educational.

But mostly fun.

And then we spent some ::ahem:: money at the store.

With a bag of chocolates we had some currywurst and then back to get the car so Ben and I could nap while Rachel chauffeured us back to Wiesbaden. 

Day One

Day Two

Day Three

Day Four

Day Six

Germany Day 4

BONN - BEETHOVAN'S HOUSE - CATHEDRAL - BOTANIC GARDEN - MINERAL MUSEUM - EVANGELICAL CHURCH - COLOGNE 

Fur Elise anyone? We started our day in Bonn visiting Beethovan's house. No pics allowed indoors, but we got a few in the garden outside. My biggest takeaway was that hearing aids have come a very long way since the 1800's. 

Clearly, I am really sensitive to culture and beauty.

The gift shop and my credit card enriched all of our lives with the addition of this rubber duck to our group. 

Oh, another Beethoven gem - a bizarre sculpture of a half-dressed Ludwig sitting on a chair adorned with creepy heads. 

Moving onward through Bonn we came across the cathedral.

Another awkward stroll inside with Ben. You'd think he would have gotten used to it, but nope.

The palace in Bonn is now owned by the University of Bonn and houses a botanic garden including plants from all around the world. I assumed this meant that if you weren't allergic to what was blooming in Germany at the time, you could find something else here to trigger your itchy eyes and runny nose. 

The palace also includes a mineralogical museum. Shockingly enough, we were the ONLY ONES visiting the museum (not sure what that is about!). This collection is not labeled in both German and English (an exception on this trip actually), but it was all interesting to look at regardless.

In the fourth room I found this sturdy cabinet. This intrigued me. Could it be? Could this be radioactive material?? My German is quite rudimentary, but I am pretty sure that "Uranprojekt" means uranium project and some of the other words reference Nazis. So, yeah.

We took the scenic route back to the car and found the German equivalent of a Little Library. 

AND another church!

Then it was time to jump back in the car and head to Cologne!

Day One

Day Two

Day Three

Day Five

Day Six