Dallas Pictures

Well so far I am unable to upload photos into Blogger. I hate Blogger. So you will just have to view my slideshow from Flickr here.

My technical presentations went very well. I was nervous, but I don't think it showed too much. I'm very good about slowing my breath and heartrate, but I could feel that towards the end I was talking a bit too fast. I got lots of good questions which is always a good sign.

The session I moderated was not quite as smooth as I hoped, which was all my fault. I thought the session started at 9am for some reason, so I planned to show up at 8:30 for setup. My first assistant moderator bailed on me last week, and my second assistant had no experience and didn't show up to the briefing the day before. But the session actually started at 8:30, so I walked into my session about a minute late, and the second assistant was kind of freaking out. Thankfully my speakers were experienced and ready to go. Nobody in the audience really noticed. I had what may have been the #1 most popular session of the entire week, on membrane bioreactors. Seating was for about 200 and at one point I had every chair filled and people lining both the side and back walls of the room, with a line of people 4 deep out the door trying to hear. It had to be at least 250. This makes the next part even more embaressing than showing up late.

Part of the moderators job is to remind people to silence their cell phones in between every speaker. I did that before the first three speakers, but of course phones rang at least once during every speaker anyway. It's just rude. After the third speaker finished, there was some Q&A discussion going on when I heard the all-to-familiar ring of my own cell phone, which was not in my pocket, but 10 feet away on the floor off to the side of the speakers platform where I was sitting. Shocked, I jumped up and ran over to bend down and silence it. I had my phone on vibrate the whole week, but when it counted the most it mysteriously was set to ring. I stayed crouched on the floor for a few minutes, regaining my composure, and thankfully there was a 30 minute break. After the break I introduced myself and the session again, and smirking, I humbly asked the audience to silence their phones. A low chuckle ran through the entire room, so I realized everyone knew what had happened. I apologized personally to the audience, explaining that I thought it was silenced, and said "Please do as I say, not as I do."