Arrived in Albuquerque for the AAW symposium

This year's theme for the symposium is the southwest - fitting for the setting here at the heart of Albuquerque. I had a pretty easy travel sched this morning, but I managed to leave my small digital camera on the plane. Fortunately, I had just taken all my photos (from Nepal) off the chip and loaded them onto my laptop. I'm really bummed about losing the camera, though. It's a Lumix and it takes wonderful pictures.

I spent an hour on the phone calling Northwest Airlines, the Albuquerque Airport lost and found and everyone else I could reach. No one cares about lost items on planes and I have to say that NWA was less than helpful. Bummer.

On a happier note, I've enjoyed seeing my woodturning friends and colleagues. I put my stuff into the instant gallery, dropped off some of my gear in my demonstration room, had some liquid refreshments with friends, attended the demonstrators dinner and then went to a hilarious presentation by Terry Martin and Jacques Vesery. The title was "embarrassing moments" and it featured funny photos of well-known turners. Terry and Jacques made up "interesting" stories and scenarios to go along with the photos. Mostly, these were of some of the French symposia and Emma Lake collaborations, featuring Jean Francois Escoulen, Allain Mailland, Bonnie Klein, Jacques Vesery, Michael Hosaluk, David Ellsworth and Mark Sfirri.

Everything gets rolling tomorrow morning. I have the first two rotations and then one on Saturday afternoon and the last one on Sunday morning. I'll try to post updates each night, but that will depend on how tired I am when I get back to my hotel room.