Last weekend I attended the Alberta Library Conference 2007 (ALC 2007) at Jasper Park Lodge in Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada. It was my first time at ALC and it was as much fun as everyone said it would be. For those that have not attended: the ALC does NOT stand for Alberta Library Conference… ALC refers to Free ALCohol. Starting each afternoon there are many social events with free drinks: the two opening receptions, the vendor receptions with open bar, the private cabin parties, the UofA/EPL cabin party, the BIG systems cabin party, and probably a few that I am forgetting.
I stayed in Point Cabin with my friends. It was a great cabin and a wonderful time. I regret that I was sick for a whole day and missed some of the big parties. Saturday night while others were at the dance we had margaritas, whiskey, and wine, and good company. Anne sent out an invite for drinks in our cabin to everyone in her facebook network and all the cool kids showed up. Interestingly, of all the guests that showed up, it was only keynote speaker Tod Maffin that got the invite via facebook. Hmmm, are librarians as wired as they say they are? Our guests we great no matter how they got the invite!
I made margaritas with fresh squeeze lime juice (we spent about a half an hour squeezing 15 limes to make a dozen margaritas). Damn they were strong. While Tod spoke passionately and intelligently about the nature and importance of story telling while we listened to ABBA pumping out of Misping’s laptop and I looked up Tequila is wikipedia over our self-administered wireless network. Tequila’s made from blue agave… a kind of lily, in case your wondering. We also learned that if you mix a margarita strong enough, when all the ice melts your are pretty left with a tequila shooter.
