Technical:

• Giving a technical presentation: There were about 12 attendees for my Continuous Integration talk Sunday morning (see description in comments). There were a few sysadmin types; most were developers, most from small shops. This topic is tied in with a lot of my configuration management interests, and I was glad to get a chance to talk about it. Thanks to the audience for listening and asking questions!
• Attending technical talks. I want to do more of this next year, somehow (hard to fit it all in). Went to the DevOps talk (I was surprised to be the ONLY woman out of about 45 attendees) and part of Automating Amazon EC2 with Puppet & Friends (sad the latter was delayed for 15 minutes, as that’s the one I knew less about, but couldn’t stay much longer, after it finally started). Thanks to Penguicon staff/volunteers for setting up so technical presentations went smoothly (mine and those I attended).

Non-technical:

• Making Liquid Nitrogen Ice Cream:  I made some batches all by myself, for the first time!  I think I have developed a good sense of proportions for ingredients.  People loved some of the flavors I came up with (see the Penguicon 2011 flavors in comments). Thanks to the helpful people (tweeting flavor suggestions, holding the buckets, stirring, mashing up sage, even making a few batches).  Thanks to Con Suite volunteers for helping us w’ supplies management and all.  Thanks to everyone who enjoyed the ice cream! Next year we’re going to request 2-hour blocks be put in the schedule officially for LN2, so we have sufficient time for batch-mixing and cleanup. We have other ideas to make it even better next year, too (may announce later after we’ve done more planning).
• Co-teaching Learn to Swing Dance! There were about 40 people, some who were completely new to swing dance (most had done at least some sort of dance). We got almost an hour and a half to impart what we knew about leading and following swing dance, and teach some basic moves, to a variety of musical styles. We were so happy to see people picking it up and having fun. Biggest compliment after: one couple asked if we taught locally! Another person asked which local dances we went to! They wanted MORE! What a thrill! Someone also made a point of giving us a shout-out during the con feedback session on Sunday afternoon. Thanks for letting us know you enjoyed it. Big thanks to Ops and Aaron Thul, who saved our bacon and fixed laptop-to-sound-system (cable) for us on short notice (first time teaching swing dance, didn’t realize we needed to specify that).

Over 1200 people attended Penguicon 2011.  Next year, bigger hotel!  I understand Penguicon 2012 will be in Dearborn, MI.

•  mint irish cream
• triple chocolate
• cinammon orange creamsicle
• vanilla raspberry
• another chocolate
• soda slushies

Sunday, the OLPC Roundtable and Fiction Genome panels I participated on went well; I’ll put more details in separate entries.  I got to see the liquid nitrogen splashdown in the pool, too.  I was disappointed that I didn’t actually get to attend anyone else’s technical panels, but it was important to me to get enough sleep to be alert for my panels.  Maybe the third time (next year) will work out better in that respect.

I didn’t make it to the game room except for 5 minutes once, but I did get to play euchre in the con suite Sunday night.  I like it because it’s a *team* card game.  I haven’t gotten to play it much since I  left upstate NY (Rochester).  My partner Bob and I did well at first, but Bill and Gerald caught up and beat us eventually.  It was a nice close game.

Penguicon has a very well-stocked consuite for food (fresh vegetables and sandwich makings, not just snack food), but I highly recommend these two restaurants within a short drive of Troy:

• Elie’s Mediterranean (Birmingham)  - the best of that cuisine I’ve ever had, in a lovely setting (cobalt blue hanging beads, rollaway glass garage door in the front of the store)
• The Inn Season Cafe (Royal Oak) – vegetarian and vegan; listed in Health Magazine’s top 6 US independent restaurants this month.

A close second was “Geek Spaces” (organization and display of one’s books, art, and collectibles), chiefly due to the enthusiasm of an attendee for the game room project I mentioned (leading to much drafting on paper and brainstorming of possibilities). 

Alas, the Regency Dance was cancelled.  Fortunately, the waltz and tango classes were great.  What does dance have to do with Knowledge Management?  I’ll give you a hint:  buzz, bzzz, buzz…