CASE

Now that I'm back home, I can write a blog post about my experience last week at CASE... Sort of. Let's just sum it up to say it was the most stressful conference I've ever attended. I didn't see much of New Orleans (though I did walk around the French Quarter and stopped at Cafe du Monde to eat a beignet. Wow! Delish!) because I spent the majority of my free time for the first few days dealing with my broken cell phone. Fortunately I had the iPad with me. Unfortunately we stayed in the only hotel on the planet to not have wifi in the guest rooms, or any where other than the lobby! It was stressful.

Anyway... there were some highlights of the trip. The conference was great. I learned a lot, and I heard some FABULOUS speakers. Like, knock-my-socks-off. Archie Manning kicked the conference off with our keynote address.  He was great. Super funny and very humble. He's such a proud dad (he even won "Father of the Year" in 2006), and I'm sure his three boys are just as proud to their claims as "Archie's son".

The last session of the conference was a panel discussion between Mary Matalin and her husband James Carville (who was wearing tennis shoes with his suit), which was pretty cool. I had to leave early to make it to the airport, but the part of that I saw was great. It was fun just to see them (specifically him, I had to admit I had never seen or heard of her before) in person rather than on tv.

However, I would have to say, the best part of the conference* was hearing Liz Murray speak. She is the "Homeless to Harvard" girl, author of Breaking Night and the inspiration for this Lifetime movie.




Oh.my.word. Not only is her story amazing, but her speaking style and her personality are so inviting. The whole room (of about 1,000 people) were crying, laughing and we were all totally engaged in what she had to tell us. Read this book! I bought it and got her to sign it at the conferece, and I have blown through reading her story in detail. If you ever have the chance to hear her speak, do it!

*The best part of the trip was getting to spend time with Sheri.