Convention

This week/weekend I attended the annual American Speech-Language Hearing Association (ASHA) convention in Chicago. I usually don't attend said conference, but since it was in Chicago, my work agreed to pay for it, my sister works for the association and was coming to the convention and another friend from SF was coming, I said hell yes! I got to spend 2 nights at a hotel downtown with my sister, drink fancy cocktails in the hotel bar and spend time with old friends.

But then there was the convention. A colleague likened it to Disneyland for speech-language pathologists. There was something to do every second. There was a huge exhibit hall with lots of free crap like pens, tote bags and even stuffed elephants and bees! The shopping was a dream - I restocked my flavored tongue depressors and bought some speech games and cards - oh my! But as for the actual learning part of the convention - eh. Every session was jam packed full of SLPs. I didn't get an actual chair to sit on until Saturday morning. The most interesting topics like working with preschoolers with language disorders were full 20 minutes before they started. I guess I walked away with a few new tidbits of knowledge but in general I was not too inspired. But maybe I'm being too picky - it was great to be at a convention and read about all the cutting edge research that's happening in my field. One day I'd love to go get my PhD. You know, with all that free time I have.

Until then, I think I'll just go sniff my tongue depressors and play with my bee.