The very first American Library Association annual conference that I ever attended was held in Dallas back in 1989. It was not a pleasant experience. It was the middle of summer, and very hot and humid. My hotel was miles away from the convention center too. Getting around was a big drag, and the wait to catch the bus to where the action was at the various hotels and the convention center downtown took forever. Subsequent trips, in 2006 and 2012, as I recall, were much more pleasant, however. This particular ALA gathering, Midwinter, 2012, was a lot of fun, mostly because I got to spend time with two wonderful friends, Ricardo Andrade, and Tracy Stout. Our hotel was smack dab in the middle of downtown, and there was lots to do. We walked over to Pioneer Plaza one day and had a blast taking photos with the cattle drive sculptures, and then later we went to a reception sponsored by Elsevier, one of the big library vendors. My friend Tracy has a video of me riding the mechanical bull and falling off of it. I’ve linked it in case you want to see me make a fool of myself. Ricardo is one of my best friends, and I miss him very much. I haven’t seen him in a while. He used to work in Tucson at the U of A Library, but has since moved on to other jobs in Chicago (University of Chicago) and New York where he currently works at the Columbia University Medical Library. Tracy is a former Knowledge River (UA Library School) student, and a dear friend who lives in Missouri, where she works as an academic librarian at Missouri State University. We’ve spent time together at various conferences over the years– New Orleans, Philadelphia and Dallas, and each time we’ve had some pretty wild adventures, but it’s been a while. I hope to see them again one day soon!