Kalamazoo Friday Update – Social Time and Not Farming Naked

It’s Saturday morning and I’m waiting for it to become late enough to head to breakfast. This year I’ve generally been sleeping well, but not long. I’ve awoken each morning around 4:30 a.m. The downside of this is that in pretty much every session I’ve been to, there’s been some point where I had to fight to keep from nodding off. I’ve not snoozed my way through much, but there have been struggles and I suspect there will be again today.

Yesterday started out with light rain but that stopped early and by midday the sun was out and it warmed up. I spent the entire day in Schneider and went to three very good sessions, including my first Anglo-Saxon one in some time. I also got some work done during the break which was necessary. The intern I’ll have starting at work next week will now have a job description.

I did the solitary dinner at Bilbo’s thing, then went to the Early Medieval Europe Reception in Bernhard where I ran into Cullen Chandler, Chris Armstrong, Guy Halsall, Julie Hoffman (briefly) and several grad students, some of whom recognized this blog (one said it’s an inspiration which was very pleasant to hear).

This was evidently my evening to be a party animal as I rejoined several of these same people back in Valley III for more libations. I’m not absolutely certain but I believe these were hosted by Brill and the University of Pennsylvania Press. Brill might argue as I own only one of their books but I have enough of Penn’s that I don’t think they’ll mind me having a drink or two on them.

I very much enjoyed getting a chance to talk to some of these folks. The evening was also interesting in that I was able to discuss some aspects of my real job with several people, particularly a cover crops project I’m just getting started. Remember – don’t farm naked! Anyway, for a few minutes here and there, I actually wasn’t the least intelligent person at this conference.

Today will of course mean more sessions, Pseudo Society, possibly the dance for the first time since my first Congress 15 years ago, and I still haven’t gone through Powell’s at the book exhibit. Current book count stands at 14. I’ve been very good.