Welcome to my blog of the 2015 NMRA National Convention, the "Portland Daylight Express"
Sunday is actually Day 2 for me, as I am the Clinic AV volunteer for the convention, and we spent yesterday setting up computers and projectors for the clinics. The Pacific Northwest Region graciously gave us a budget to buy new computers, so we have six nice lightweight HP "Stream Notebooks" - admittedly not powerhouses, but capable of running PowerPoint and Adobe Reader, which is all they should be used for.
Three of them we updated to Windows 10 (not realizing it was going to take them all night to accomplish this), and the other three are updating now. The main reason for the update is this: PowerPoint Mobile. It's an app that allows us to run modern PowerPoint files without any compromises (the old PowerPoint viewer, we discovered, wouldn't play embedded videos). That, and Windows 8, even 8.1, irritates me. It's good to be the Crown Prince (Charlie Comstock of BC&SJ fame is the King - the Clinic Coordinator).
So, because of my job, I didn't get much time to wander around today, and was not able to attend any clinics, aside from glancing in the door. We've got six rail clinic rooms and one non-rail clinic room, that looks a bit like a garment factory, with sewing machines set up all around it - they are making blankets for Project Linus. The non-rail room also has a large banquet room that they'll be using for movies and other get-togethers.
So here are some photos that I shot with my phone today, starting with the Tour Room, where a bunch of hardworking ladies were working to help people go on the layout and prototype tours they wanted to -
The Pre-Registration Desk, where you picked up your badge, timetable and local information, stayed fairly busy throughout the day - and the area around it was a popular gathering and conversation spot -
Chooch Enterprises put on a clinic about their scenery products -
Of course, the next several conventions had displays here, including Orlando in 2017 -
Indianapolis in 2016 -
And Kansas City in 2018 -
The Selkirk Express, 2016 PNR Regional Convention in Canada, was also represented -
The SIG room has grown a bit from when it was just the OpSig and LD-Sig, there is now C/MRI (celebrating it's 30th anniversary) and LCC (Layout Command Control, a new NMRA standard for Layout Control) -
This is the convention office, which is filled with door prizes -
Down at the other end of the first floor is the R&R (Rest & Relaxation) room, a quiet place to read and chat -
The Non-Rail "Project Linus" room -
And here we have convention volunteers taking in items for the Silent Auction -
They've got lots of tables to fill -
Finishing out the day, the Ice Cream Social in Holliday Park across the street from the hotel was very well attended, and several people stopped to ask what was going on. Some conventioneers from California and myself may have talked two young ladies into coming to the National Train Show next weekend -
And that's it for my Day 1 report - hopefully I'll be able to get out and cruise some clinics tomorrow, now that I'm fairly sure we won't be facing any major technological disasters. And hopefully I'll be able to pull out my DSLR as well.....
