Not even sure what day it is at this point. Today was kind of unreal onsite. Twice as many people came to onsite registration than ever before. We weren’t just swamped or overwhelmed… I don’t even have the words to describe what that was. We just registered people. As fast as possible. And tried to stay alive in order to keep going. Our new system went really, really well and I think everyone felt better about it, and I still maintain that my coworkers are the best. I’m just kind of in shock still.

I came back, had a bite to eat–not because I was hungry but because it was dinner time and I’m not really capable of feeling anything so I only knew it was time to put food in mouth.

I went to the keynote but ended up sitting up in the balcony because the VIP seats were filled already. But I had a fantastic seat and I’m quite glad I opted to sit there in the end. I’m not a poet and know nothing about Derek Walcott’s work, but I took an Irish lit class in undergrad for my creative writing minor and we read quite a bit of Seamus Heaney’s poems. It was amazing to listen to two Nobel Prize-winners read and discuss things like the silences before pieces of art and the complexities of languages. I totally forgot to bring my camera because, frankly, I don’t really know much of what’s going on right now. I honestly feel like I’m on autopilot. So these are just boring entries until my mind returns. In the wait before it started, I kept having registration flashbacks and almost bursting into tears in a kind of PTSD panic, but once the event started I was all right. I think a quiet night here might be in order, though I have to be up in 7.5 hours to do it all over again.