I have to say, being away from home makes you appreciate the little things. It also makes you crazy. The hour-long lines for breakfast, lunch and dinner; the immensely crowded hallways, the endless rain… it’s all stuff I could live without.
Friday, I went to a class that, I thought, was going to be about team bonding. It ended up being about how to get good quotes. I guess it pays to read the class descriptions.
The best part about a national convention isn’t the dirty and sweaty mob of the dance floor, the host city’s greatest tourist attractions or the raucous roommates that steal sleep with late-night discussion and group-worship of Conan O’Brien’s comedic genius.
No, the greatest part of coming to the largest assembly of young journalists is the camaraderie within 6,000 kids that are exactly like you.
Sightseeing sucks.
Sure it’s great to see history come alive and walk where Washington’s greats trod and to feel the power that runs through D.C.’s electrifying air. But it’s also a drag. Why?
1. Pen and notebook
It’s absolutely essential. There’s a billion and a half lobbyists flaunting their business around here, and you don’t want to hear a sweet yearbook offer that you can’t review later in writing. And with write-offs, the journalist convention’s two-hour marathon of quality and scrawled writing, coming up quickly tonight, a sharp pen and an excessive amount of paper will be priceless this weekend.
Correction: I meant “everything’s bigger in Texas” in my last blog, not “nothing’s bigger in Texas” There is some sort of talent show going on here in the Marriot Ballroom. A dance group called “Colours” is onstage, “Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag” is blasting from the speakers and kids are pouring into the room.…
The Friday afternoon keynote session at the JEA/NSPA Convention started out on an energetic note with a performance from local D.C. dance troupe Colours, who bounced on stage and through the crowd to the sounds of James Brown, Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson, frequently with the students in the crowd joining in.
And the optimistic tone continued when veteran newspaper reporters, and married couple, Peter Baker and Susan Glasser took the stage to speak to the crowd about the future of journalism.
I was expecting the classes to be larger, but what I was not expecting was to be the last person to get a chair at a 9 a.m. lecture at 8:45 in a room that seats 150.
It was worth duking it our for the last chair though to see my favorite speaker, Dave LaBelle, even if I did have to peak through heads to see him.
This is a few days overdue, but it’s been the most memorable part of the trip so far.
Taking my own, real pictures of President Obama was worth the six hours I sat in the near freezing rain. Being able to be at the Veteran’s Day wreath laying ceremony was not something I had expected to do on the trip.
Walsworth is here in our nation’s capital capturing the sights and sounds of the 2009 JEA/NSPA conference. If you aren’t here in Washington, D.C., don’t fret as you can keep coming back to Walsworth Live to see more videos from the event. If you are at JEA/NSPA, come by our booth and give us a shout, if not let us know your thoughts on what you are watching here and we hope to see you 2010! Watch the video now!
Yearbook conventions are the best. (Well, if you want to get technical about it, it’s the Journalism Education Association’s high school journalism convention, but we all know what the best part of high school journalism is–yearbooks!)
Anyways. After waking up at 3:45 a.m. on Wednesday morning for our flight out at 6, I proceeded to have a deliciously relaxing day chatting with security guards as they oh-so-tactfully told me that the way I was proceeding through their security line was entirely unacceptable. (Apparently 5′ 10″ Dutch girls with red basketball backpacks look like horrifying terrorists.)
