The first speaker concluded and a comment sheet was passed around. I gave him a 4 out of 5 average. There aren’t many things that I very strongly agree with.
We took a short break at this point and I wandered around the main floor leaving pictures in my wake.
When I returned this break was further extended because the second speaker was late.
So I left and wandered around again. And I had to keep moving because it was cold in there. It was cold everywhere in that building. They teach 90% of their classes in this building and I wouldn’t be surprised if they maintain a temperature low enough to keep people’s eyes open.
When I returned the second speaker (or who I assumed was the second speaker) was starting the presentation. This is where the troubles began.
Comparison is a funny thing. It’s based upon context. It’s not until you put something undesirable next to something desirable that you realize the degree to which you desire the one and reject the other. Such as a pretty girl who surrounds herself with ugly friends or leaving a building and walking into a torrential downpour.
I walked into that room and started getting soaked.
The second speaker was Hispanic hombre with a bit of an accent. This made would have made his pitch disagreeable enough if he had been talking loudly, which he wasn’t. Initially there were a number of cries for the crowd for him to speak up but eventually the folks just gave up. He was also basically reading the slides verbatim and this only helped turn the room against him.
But this wasn’t the Apollo. No one was going to boo him off the stage. These were potential volunteers
for disaster relief. They showed their displeasure with sighs and shifting around in their seats.
The second problem was that the second speaker was having technical issues with the slideshow. There were about 8 movie clips embedded in the slideshow. The only way he could get them to play was to exit the slideshow and play the source files directly with Windows Media Player. This opening and closing of windows only magnified the wetness.
Finally with a third of the presentation left the real second speaker arrived. His words were loud and clear. Magically the movies in the slideshow began working again. A bundle of stapled papers made its way to everyone and we were broken up into small groups to discuss a few different scenarios. After around 8 minutes we came together again and had a discussion.
With the discussion concluded the speaker resumed his presentation. He even had the grace to let us out five minutes early. And so I left with hardly any noticeable squish in the shoes of my stride.
