My jaunt to the desert has run into travel taffy time. For some reason, it always seems to take me longer then I planned when leaving the desert. Last night I missed my connecting flight by five minutes at O’Hare and I’m currently doing my best to be “productive” (shout out to Jeb Dickerson).
So I thought I might try something I do not always do that well: bundle up the impressions, takeaways and experiences in a post before retuning back to my quiet corner in the Catskills.
The trip had four main activities: visiting The Valley of Fire; WordCamp; dinner with writer/blogger Evelyn Rodriguez; visiting Red Rocks.
The Valley of Fire:
After my engaging the petroglyph’s as images, I’m now learning that they are more like hieroglyphs, and all those sheep in the image I was taken with are verbs. If your interested in this types of thing, I reading an amazing book, The Rocks Begin to Speak by LaVan Martineau. In it he revels how much of the picture writing is related to the sign language that tribes used from Alaska to Mexico. It also provides references to the classic texts on sign language in it bibliography.
WordCamp: I live tweeted much of the experience. A great job of hosting by @vegasgeek John Hawkins. He put together a lineup of speakers that covered breadth with depth.
Wordpress developer Matt Mullerug did something that I respect tremendously. After providing the keynote, he stayed and participated in WordCamp both days.
Chris Brogan is the funniest geek I’ve ever heard. I think his unstated goal for ‘09 is to do a stand up gig on Comedy Central. That said, he’s also got this great point across: in this media “use small snackable content.”
Liz Strauss (I posted on her presentation here) keeps it simple while accomplishing something quite complex. Her tri-dimensional communication strategy, especially the part about posting to your future self, defines the right posture for this media. Our data packets, these messages in blogs and social media platforms, are public and searchable, in theory, forever.
One last note to future self: When your goal is selling, the danger is coming off as either the guy at the used car lot or the lady on the corner (perhaps a combination of both). Worst of all, don’t say your giving it away when your really selling it.
Evelyn Rodriguez: While she didn’t attend WordCamp (she’s over at typepad) Evelyn sent me an invitation to get together. My gratitude for social media is that it has allowed me to meet people like Evelyn. Our three hour discussion on writing, myth, travel and being “on the road” was the greatest gift I found in Vegas. Twitter her @eve11.
Red Rocks: The magic and beauty of this canyon really capped off the trip. It was great to take out the camera and do the loop drive. At one point while seated on a sandstone ledge, a wild horse, hidden in a small stream bed, brayed loudly. My two hours here put it on a list of places to return to for at least at a week of camping.
...if it looks you in the eye and you look back
Lifestream Digest for October 2nd
Pictograph at Red Rocks