Peripatetic Blogging

MY PERIPATETIC BLOGGING

Peripatetic. 
A favorite word of mine.  I used it in a Biology paper in the 10^thGrade
(as memory serves, I think I was describing the fertilization process ,
viz-a-viz zygotes) and the teacher asked me what the word meant. 
And she was the one with
the college education and the advanced degree!

You
could look it up, it is a very useful word.  You could also Google
peripatetic and zygotes [1], and get 17 hits.

There
are a few accepted definitions of peripatetic; one being Aristotlean.  I
use it meaning meandering, in constant motion, going from place to place, also
meaning that is comes and goes, yet is understood to be returning to those
places where it makes itself known.  Sort of like a reliable train that
will make the station stop, but not necessarily on a dependable schedule.

Yep,
that describes how I post to this blog.  Peripatetically.  Especially
of late.

Joltiní Joe DiMaggio

I
was thinking of making an analogy to my peripatetic posting.  Used here
before, it would have pointed out that I often am asked, Where Have You Been,
Joe DiMaggio [2], in that sing-song style a la Simon & Garfunkel [3] from The Graduate [4] 
soundtrack.

But
the main reference points when one thinks of Joe DiMaggio are not so much of
his absence, as in the Simon & Garfunkel song, as they are of his
incredible 56 game hitting streak [5]
in 1941, his nickname: The Yankee Clipper, his marriage to Marilyn
Monroe, and that great statement of his [6] thatís now inscribed on a wall at Yankee Stadium: "I want to
thank God for making me a Yankee."

Oh,
I almost forgot: some people think of Joltiní Joe as a spokesman for
The Bowery Bank for Savings, or for Mr. Coffee. 
Wouldnít it have been great if the Bowery Bank had given away Mr. Coffee
machines for opening new accounts, and a signed bat if you also opened an IRA
or CD with them?!?!

Of
course, these days, people who are Yankee fans are probably praying to the God
of their choice that the Yanks will awaken their bats, and find starting
pitchers capable of winning games. And relievers capable of holding the lead or
staunching the bleeding..

Perhaps the ghost of The Clipper can be evoked, to
perform some posthumous magic on the present-day Pinstripers [7].





CONFERENCE CACOPHONY

Yesterday
I mentioned that there are more conferences than there is time (or
money) to attend, despite so many of them seeming interesting,
alluring, educational, or just a hoot.  One must make choices --
is the travel time and cost worth the gain? 

• Are
  the speakers going to offer something new, insights, findings, fresh
  data, or will it be the same old rehash of everything we've heard
  before?
• Will the speakers have handouts so there is something to pore over, to review, after the fact? 
  
• Will the venue enable decent lines of sight and proper miking and amplifying of the speakers?
  
  
  

Yesterday
I received an e-mail with a link to a conference to be held in NY in a
matter of days.  It comes right on the heels of another
conference, one I am definitely attending.  This raises more
questions.

• Can I afford to spend three days in a row at conferences, especially as my workload and responsibilities seem to be increasing?
• And why is it that these two very separate topic conferences happen to have so many of the same speakers?

Which leads us to a key concern: Why is there an A-List group of "the
usual suspects," presenting and keynoting at so many events?  Do
these erudite individuals know everything about everything?  Does
one become an internet superstar and impart wisdom and insights on
anything and everything that has something to do with the connected
world?



A friend and I were discussing the conference I am definitely
attending, and then we touched on two or three more meetings coming up
in the NY area over the next few months, and some other major
conferences of note, both in and out of the NY area.



We looked at who the keynoters and other speakers would be.  It
seems that the short-list of A-Level All Star presenters is fully
booked for the coming season.  Hmmm, could we just pick a few
meetings, and possibly manage to glean all of the information that
would be scattered among the many meetings, by paring it down to a
small group, but managing to see/hear the full complement of A-List
presenters?



Here's another annoying rub: I know a good few of these Conference All
Stars. Some are friends, some are acquaintances, and then yet some more
are people I am close to and whose friendship and input is very
valuable to me.



But yet these are people with whom I am in contact on a pretty regular
basis.  And some of them, to be cruelly candid, should not be
speaking at some of these meetings.  Yes, sure, they are very
enchanting and entertaining speakers.  But the core topic area of
some of these conferences should render them as luncheon speaker
entertainment, not panel or seminar participants, and surely not as
experts.



And let's face it: some speakers give the same speech, practically word for word, no matter what the venue.



The irony of all of the above is that I know
this, I know the people, and to varying degrees I am up to snuff on the
conference topic agendae.  And yet the allure of some of these
meetings is so very high.  Even ones that I suspect will be all
party and no substance, or all shmooze no clues . . .still manage to have a certain
appeal.

Maybe if I win the lottery I could just make
going to conferences a full time gig. Of course, it would help if I
ever bought a lottery ticket.

I suppose there's still time for that.  Maybe I should hear out a panel of experts and see what they think.