Conference Conundrum

Hello, I hope everyone has had a more fabulous week than the thought of a symphony performed entirely by using vegetables as instruments!

We are getting ever closer to that magical time of year, or that time of year where you add a little extra kick to your egg-nog, your choice. If you are still on the hunt for that perfect Christmas gift don't forget Life is a Circus Run by a Platypus!

Half of the proceeds from book sales this month will go to benefit the YWCA in their work to empower women, end racism and help victims of domestic violence!

In other exciting news, I was also interviewed this past week by fellow writer Charissa Dufour on her blog, Too Particular.

So if you wanted to know the inner workings of my mind, I'd suggest you check it out!

Well, I spent the majority of this past week at a, program specific, social work conference with my boss. It's a good thing I have an awesome boss.

Oh, wait, I can't call it a conference because apparently that now has a bad connotation to it thanks to some "conferences" (aka multi-million dollar vacations) held by some members of Congress. I must now call it a "training."

When I mention to people that I am going to a conference, their replies somehow denote that they think that I will be sitting on a beach somewhere with a drink that contains some fruity flavored alcohol complete with little umbrella.

This NEVER Happens

What actually occurs is that we end up sitting in endless seminars and "special luncheon" sessions while someone endlessly verbally ambles about some topic that would be fascinating and educational... if it wasn't what we already did at our jobs every single day.

One seminar I went to was so boring that some lady, in the front row, fell asleep and open-mouthed snored for fifteen minutes.

Not all of the lectures I attended were awful. There was one about how to sell your program's effectiveness to politicians where the lady stood up and basically said, "Make it sound like you're getting people jobs, getting them off of welfare and therefore saving them money. Don't talk about the squishy stuff and make it all about them and you'll be fine," and then sat down.

We all wanted to hug this woman for her honesty.

Another great thing about this conference, I got my own room. Jumping on the beds may or may not have happened.

Apparently this particular conference, I mean "training," also had the unique ability to rob my boss and I, who I like to think of as normally two capable women, of some of our thinking abilities.

At one point my boss and I were in her hotel room working on a project and she picked up a little card that had instructions for who to call if we had questions. My boss read the card and said, "You know, that is the strangest spelling for the name 'Caroline' that I have ever seen!"

I looked at the card and said, "Kim, this is a card telling you to call the Careline."

To be fair, I can't read the word "coworker" without reading "cow-orker" first. 

Then, a little while later I found I had left some materials we needed in my room, which was right across the hall. As I was headed back towards my room I suddenly realized I also had to use the restroom, so I called over my shoulder, "It'll take me a minute, I have to pee."

During this announcement I had been in the process of opening up the hotel room door. And there in the hallway was a man staring at me like I had just smacked him with a fish. 

After a second, I realized that from his perspective I had just flung a door open and announced, quite loudly, to a complete stranger that I had to pee.

We stood there looking at each other for a brief moment before I finally just said, "And now you know," as I strode across the hallway into my own room.

I survived our "training," though, and am now home, rather tired, but mostly unscathed.

I did want to touch on one other quick point with my readers before I scamper away. If you happen to have read and and enjoyed Life is a Circus Run by a Platypus, do me a huge favor, take a few minutes and post a quick review on Amazon or Goodreads.

As a first-time author, good reviews are like gold and will literally make me do the dance that you see to the right of the screen. Thank you so much for all those readers who have posted reviews, your wonderful words mean more than you know!

As always, I hope you all a warm and wonderful week! If you wish to follow my day-to-day exploits you can find me on Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads!