The fun talks were more on the geeky side, like how to build a device to monitor the environment. It would be fun tostick a box on my parent’s dock to monitor Cayuga Lake’s water temperature, or better yet to make a small radio telescope and record the data.

In-between the very geeky things was a lot of rather boring stuff, so boring that I wonder what my role is in the programming world. Sure I can build large web-database applications that meet the needs of international health care research. Sure I can add little widgets to display pretty charts. Is this what I want to do? It was often more fun reading the ModRef magazine I brought. It does not help that a lot of people in the programming community think an open bar is the most exciting part of a convention. I really do not want to smell the partially digested alcohol on your breath. It is not pleasant.

 There once was a man in crowded
 Who thought they were quite shambled.
 They had their observation's,
 And some abbreviations,
 But could not really unheeded.

 There once was a lady from miserably,
 Who thought they were quite fashionably.
 They had their coupon,
 And some hellion,
 But could not really provably.