Bed at 2am, alarm at 6. On 101 heading south just after 7. The fog is out, which I know is fog and not just overcast morning haze because my windshield gets wet very slowly. Maybe it’s because I drive my car back and forth to work everyday (previously I rode my bike), but my shiny black car gets much dirtier in California (where is doesn’t rain!) than it did in NC. Ok that’s totally not true, there are those two or so weeks in the spring when the pine trees get all randy and exploded in orgasms of neon green pollen. Which coated everything. Especially cars.

The BlogHer conference started early, and I managed to get there exactly at 8:30am (on time!), walked into the back of the main hall just as the organizers were introducing themselves. Among the 270 odd attendees, there was ae right in front of me, a familiar face from the Chapel Hill blogger meetups.

As I type everyone is gathered into ad hoc birds of a feather sessions on various topics, and I’m slinking back, feigning professional objectivity, in reality just being too tired to socialize, but everyone talking f2f means I can actually get on the previously overloaded wireless network. They called these BoFs “blog crushes”, and so far I’ve seen Heather Armstrong and Mena Trott, two people who I’d probably have a crush on if I read their blogs more regularly. Ah, the social construct of fame. I still hold that blogging is a form of personal fame creation (or emulation). The crazy truth is that they are all real people—my virtual familiar strangers.

I have one complication. The Bay Area Carolina Club is having their annual BBQ about 30 minutes from here, so I’ll be leaving just before lunch, dropping in to meet up with the Tarheel diaspora, and seeing whether it’s possible to get “real Carolina BBQ” out west. Then I’ll race back and try to catch the tail end of the session with the Dooce herself.