TITLE: SIGCSE Day 1: A Conference First
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: March 09, 2007 10:17 AM
DESC: 
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BODY:
<IMG SRC="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog-images/sigcse/cincinnati-skyline.jpg"
     ALT="the Cincinnati skyline"
     ALIGN="right"
     WIDTH="200">

My
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~schafer/">
   roommate</A>
and I are staying in the
<A HREF="http://www.radisson.com/covingtonky">
   Radisson Riverfront</A>,
which is right across the river from downtown Cincinnati at
the nexus of the Ohio River and I-75.  The view from our
14th-floor room is good.

So there I was, settling in after a long day at the conference.
About 10 PM, the phone rings.  Odd.  The caller asks for me.
Odd again.  It's the front desk.  The local police have asked
all guests to come down to the lobby.

Apparently, someone had shot a bullet into a 12th-floor room.
From somewhere outside.

Odd.

Down we went to the lobby.  We heard lots of curious smalltalk,
and no small amount impatience at being inconvenienced by this
interruption.  Some commented that we hardly seemed safer all
herded into one place, in front of wide glass lobby windows
open to the interstate exit.

After 25 minutes or so, the chief of the Covington Police
Department called us together.  "Welcome to Covington!" he
offered in good humor.  He explained what had happened, what
the police had done to investigate, and that they now believed
us to be safe.  He thanked us for our patience and wished us
a good visit.  I can imagine that he is a good sort of person
to have as a police chief -- a big part of the job is communicating
with people who are in varying states of distress.

The rest of the night passed without event.

Let's see if OOPSLA can top this.
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