Halloween and the Conference

Our conference started off bright and early this morning at the Omni. I made it into Richmond right around 7 a.m. If I had a room upstairs it would have been a good time to get some photos of the city.

Dr. Gaudio & Anita really got into the spirit of Halloween first thing this morning. It was great fun. He's the "Dentistry Wizard".

Our speaker, Dr. Brian Mealy, spoke to us about periodontial disease and diabetes. Although the presentation was a clinical one, the material covered was amazing. The group was all ears. By lunch time I felt like I had been through several levels of college biology. WOW! The connections were amazing.

I've got to give it to Brian, he did a great job getting the things together at the Omni for the conference. Since I had been out of the loop on the preparations it was great to walk in and find everthing done. THANKS! Brian. Loved the selections for the breaks and lunch.

We ended off around 5, but the day didn't end there. Brian had set up a great cocktail hour for the group - there were lots of comments on the fantastic job he did picking out the appetizers. We had crab cakes, mini quesadillas, spring rolls, meatballs, and another that was made up of artichoke and mushrooms on pita bread. Yum.

Of course since it was Halloween, we went on a Haunts of Richmond tour. We had a little bit of an transportation issue that we had to resolve, but four cabs and about ten minutes we all arrived at the Edgar Allen Poe Museum. Our tour started out in the garden behind the museum. This is the garden behind the Edgar Allen Poe Museum. The building in the back is a shrine to Edgar Allen Poe. The carriage house on the right, is thought to be haunted by a little boy. Moving on to a walking tour through Shockhoe bottom (lots of Civil War ghost in the old tobacco warehouses). Further along in the tour we moved into Shockhoe Slip to finish off the tour with he ghost of the brothel above the microbrewery on the corner just down from the hotel on Cary Street.

Now we didn't see any 'ghosts' but we did see some odd sights. Various goulish characters, a few sweet ones, the trashy group, and even an Elvis sighting! We stayed at the microbrewery for a late snack, one of the waiters had googly eyes all over his head. 'All eyes were on him.' One guy was dress in a late 70's get-up, platform shoes, bell bottoms, and full afro. What a flashback!

Then there were the was really funny Gingerbread man roaming the Slip with a Transformer. We caught sight of him after we heard a number of people hollering down the street from us.

The Gingerbread man was yelling something back. Which we thought should have been, "Eat me, Eat me." After peals of laughter, Anita (from NJ) had her picture taken with him. She even looks like she might get a bite in her photo.

All in all it was a really fun day. The group is really coming together and becoming friends. I really enjoyed the evening out with them, particularly Dr. Gaudio, Anita, & Dr. & Jules Gaeta. Great people!

Instead of heading back out to the apartment for the night, I stayed at the Omni for the evening. The room was great, and even had a nice view of the river.