Re: COMMON - the week's over...

I heard a lot of positive feedback. I know the flying situation was not optimal. When we chose Reno, there were about 33% more airline seats coming in I'm told - could not predict the airlines would cut back back when the contracts were inked!

At least that should not be a problem with Orlando! There should also be some good economical dining choices very nearby - not sure about without a car or cab, but luckily car rental is fairly cheap there. I should be out there in September, so I'll check the property out, as I believe it opens in August.

And I for one was thrilled they were a Pepsi location! That is so rare these days! I don't mind regular Coke, but my blood sugar does, and Coke Zero is tolerable, but unavailable even at most Coke sellers! Easy access to Diet Pepsi was a Godsend!

Of course getting home from the conference and a side trip to Vegas with the wife was dampered by the surprise announcement that I was let go, so I have a whole new challenge ahead!

Jeff Carey


-----Original Message-----

From: LÃo Lefebvre <leo@xxxxxx>
Sent: May 5, 2009 10:44 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: COMMON - the week's over...

"Leo, what's the latest on your appointment to being the LUG Chair?? "

Hi Don,

I'll be looking at (continue to look at) the LUG business!

Leo Lefebvre
President
Toronto Users Group for Power Systems
Visit our home page at [1]http://www.tug.ca
Ph: (416) 606-5960 --- [2]leo@xxxxxx

Don wrote:

COMMON - epilog



Well, the week is over.



The Grand Sierra is probably the closest venue to the airport that I've ever
been to at a COMMON. The prices, well, they could have been a lot better.
This is the first COMMON that I've actually stayed on property for the
conference and I feel I should be calling Obama for a stimulus
package.actually, I think I've stimulated the Reno economy A LOT and now I
need some refunding. The hotel rooms, while very nice, weren't cheap and
internet at $13/day was just a rip off. It was nice though to have all the
rooms in close proximity and to not have to drag through a casino to go to
where I wanted to go. But it wasn't anywhere near the offering and comfort
of places like the 3-b/r suite I get in Orlando for $500/wk that I'll be
staying at in Sept for the iseries tech conf.



Expo in terms of area hit me as smaller. Very few of the larger booths and
at last count less than 80 vendors there. Some didn't show up and I've yet
to work the phones to find out why.



IBM Systems magazine party was great..so was the Linova event! Met some
interesting people at both, including some real interesting partiers from
Houston.



Sessions were good - but since I was doing the conference on a Table PC and
needed the .pdf's for the presentations found that many missing
presentations from the web was a real annoyance. Even had to roust a few
speakers to post their handouts or just email them directly. Wasted time
in one session downloading the handout from the speakers website - great
speaker and presentation - just wish'd their handout had been available
before hand.



Enjoyed Scott's youtube's! Way to go dude!



LUG noon meeting on Wednesday was good. Have started adding AIX user group
officials and liasons to the interlug.



Congrads to Pete, Trevor and Hoss for election - be careful what you ask for
- you may get it.:-)



Leo, what's the latest on your appointment to being the LUG Chair??



After wasting a day each way in travel and dealing with an airline with next
to no customer service (Delta), I'm giving serious consideration to
attending those conferences I can either get fairly direct flights to or
preferably drive.



Hard to find Coke products there.but they could be found in the basement if
you knew where.I hate hotels that only want to serve pepsi products!



Ran into a lot of folks that want me to still write product reviews - both
vendors and users. Look for this to fire up shortly. Announcement on M-L
and MMU when it happens.:-)



DR2









References

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