And DAVID LEVITHAN!!!

I could not believe how noisy the people next door were – crazy librarians yukking it up at midnight for over an hour while I tried to get back to sleep! Granted, I’m crazy go-to-bed-early girl here because I’m so tired, but what is the deal? That is so inconsiderate and something I expect from teenage boys and not grown women. I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt that they are from California and having some kind of clock-resetting problem. Perhaps with alcohol being a factor (I heard people stumbling and I don’t think jet lag makes you that clumsy.)

I went to the continental breakfast, which was yummy as always and then headed across the street to the Marriott for my Google session. It was very interesting – a nice representative of Google (who said he is one of the many librarians that work for Google) gave an in-depth talk about their Google Book and their Google Scholar products. It was interesting to hear their take on the scope and depth of the projects and how the idea came to their individual creators. Highlight was me winning a Google ball cap for identifying the picture of Jane Austen (Jane helps in so many ways).

I hustled over the convention center around 12:15 to start my exhibit hall trek. I decided to be methodical and start in the 1000 aisle (it goes up to aisle 3700). I visited a great kiosk with print/copy management software (and got some great ideas for preventing the crazy printing and copying waste we deal with), got a more in-depth demo of Sagebrush InfoCentre, saw some great library furniture that has some real possibilities for our renovation, and picked up hordes of ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies) from HarperCollins. I even visited the ETS booth and learned all about their new ICT exam which lots of kids will start taking and, hello, it's mostly library skills with lots of related technology skills in between! At some point, I felt really tired and thought my arms would fall off with all the free stuff, so I hiked to the UPS store and filled up one box and rented another to hold all my freebies. And I only finished the 1200 aisle!! I bothered to look at my cell phone for the time and realized it was 3:30!

Realizing I was borderline dehydrated and that Ethan would yell at me (he really lectured me about remembering to drink water with the ridiculous heat here), I dashed to the café and got a liter bottle of water and a pastry (I’ve told you everywhere has good pastry here). Then I swatted my head – David Levithan was supposed to be here at 3:00! What if I missed him! It was 3:45 and I had to get all the way across the huge exhibit floor!

So I ran to the booth he was supposed to be in, and there he was in all his curly-haired glory, calmly signing his Nick & Norah book (yes, folks, I have it ordered) and discussing someone’s upcoming marriage. Clutching the stitch in my side, I gasped out, “Oh..thank..god..you’re…still…here. I was worried I missed you!” He smiled graciously as I started telling him how we can’t keep his books on the shelf, how we read them during the Banned Books Week reading marathon, how I think he’s such a lyrical writer. Remembering what an ass I made of myself for Sarah Dessen, I tried to stay lower-key, but I don’t think I really succeeded. His publisher got me two ARCs of his new books (one he authored, Wide Awake, and he edited the other, The Full Spectrum: A New Generation of Writing About Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, and Other Identities) and he personally autographed Wide Awake to me! “To Courtney, Thank you for helping keep readers wide awake” and he put a smiley face next to his name! David Levithan drew me a smiley face!

I asked his publisher to take our picture, but she must be a little challenged when it comes to digital cameras because she ended up taking a little movie of us posing. I was able to make a frame into a jpeg, but it’s a little blurry. I think I look slightly less maniacal than yesterday, however.

Being very tired, I figured that I would just grab the bus and go home, but as I passed the ALA Bookstore in the lobby, I remembered that they were giving little tutorials on making the READ posters with the software, and since that is a long overdue project, I stopped in. I am so glad I did – the tutorial was great. Thirty minutes of great information and a great demo from the ALA people, who were super friendly and helpful. I feel very empowered to go home and start cranking out read posters. They have a second CD with even more great backgrounds, so I think I’ll end up getting that (they gave us all a coupon for a conference discount for it) just to have more options.

Home on the bus and up to the club level for snacks. This time they had as the hot appetizer, Beef Wellington in Puff Pastry, so between that, the cheese and crackers, the potato chips, several glasses of lemonade and the huge cookies the size of my head I brought back to my room, I’m all set for the night. I will need at least four days of the South Beach diet to wean myself off all this sugar!! Maybe I’ll go to the gym tonight and use the treadmill – wait a minute…I easily walked five miles today! Bring on the cookies!!