Conference

Drove the pups to that nice dog park and let them rumble. Then we went into Downtown Rapid City. The city has done an awesome job of preserving the buildings and making it a very people-friendly place. In the center, there is a large town square with an interactive fountain and a very nice stage. The fountain has maybe thirty jets that are under remote control -- it is open brickwork so people can walk between the jets -- a lot of times they are little low bubbles but every couple of minutes or so they open up and splash everyone. Great fun for the toddlers. It was hot this morning so there were a lot of people enjoying the cooling water. Had lunch at a brewpub in the old firehouse First conference day today. Went a couple hours early and walked around looking at the displays. Bought a couple books and a couple pounds of steel rivets. The convocation was OK but really wordy. They presented a couple awards and some updates on future conferences which was fine. Then, they awarded the ABANA Heritage Award to the Colonial Williamsburg Blacksmith shop for preserving the history of metalworking in America. The guy that accepted the award read a prepared speech that droned on for 45 minutes covering not only blacksmithing but everything else that Williamsburg did as well as the histories of trades from medieval times on to current. It would have been a fascinating if longish magazine article but it was not a good three-minute acceptance speech, especially when everyone was hot and wanting to get on with the ceremonial Lighting of the Forge and the evenings events. Lulu and I left after the Lighting and got a bit to eat. I dropped her off at the motel and went back from some seminars. With over 500 people registered, I did not get to participate in the one I wanted but it worked out really well -- Mark would do a demo of each step in the process and then the classmates would perform that step. He was teaching a project from one of his books (I already have both of them) so I went to each demo and watched and then visited the other tents while the classmates pounded iron. Got to cover a lot more material that way. Supposed to be a couple of really hot days through the weekend. 100 and above. Looking forward to the next couple of days! Day seven!