A Confederacy of Tooters

I've just spent the end of last week at a conference in Richmond, VA, schmoozing it up with all the big names in the world of professional tutors. But readers, it's not as glamorous as it all sounds. For example, two colleagues and I had to drive the 350 miles to the conference site in a motorpool minivan with bad rotors and an even badder smell -- which turned out to be the dog poop that two of us had stepped in prior to our departure.

The conference hotel, despite its $140/night room rate, did not provide free internet access -- nor many other amenities -- in its rooms, so for entertainment I spent a few hours each evening in the hospitality suite and people-watched while trying not to abuse my own liver too much, a task made fairly easy because the Shiraz ran out on night one of the conference and I wasn't in the mood for Chablis from a box or Bud Light from a can.

Besides, one of us had to be sober enough to drive back home Saturday morning....