around but not in GA

After spending two very profitable days attending the minister's pre-General Assembly programs, I haven't spent much time at the actual General Assembly, which began Wednesday afternoon. After attending these things for 10 years, I've pretty much sat through every program I have any interest in. And although there are some new things every year, and nearly any workshop I do attend I end up enjoying and getting at least something from, for the most part for me the worth of GA is not found in anything in the GA program.

Instead, my enjoyment is in the opportunity GA provides to meet up with fellow UUs located aroud the country: friends and colleagues I know but get to see only once a year, and those folks I get to meet at GA through some shared affinity. It's the meetings for coffee, and meals, and over drinks that really make GA for me. And in that sense my peripheral GA this year has been a great success. Last night I attended a workshop on blogging and then attended a dinner for UU bloggers at a Greek restuarant and met a bunch of the folks I've been reading but had never met. After the dinner I had drinks with a few of the bloggers: Philocrites, Peacebang, Chalice Chick, Making Chutney and Hafidha Sofia who writes, "Never say Never to your traveling self." (I've added their links in the sidebar).

Walking home from drinks with the bloggers I stopped at a gay bar a couple of blocks from my hotel and ran into some other guys here for the General Assembly, who, like me, were grooving on the ability for GA to bring people together without actually going to GA. This morning I had breakfast with a friend I've known since elementary school but who lives on the other side of the country. Both of us became UUs as adults. This is her first GA. I'm having fun. That's what a religious conference ought to be about.