Medical conferences are fun. Especially when you go to visit the Exhibit Halls, and collect the loot. Pens, cute gadgets, tote bags, candy, and a lot of smiling PR types who are anxious to sell you their product. In this case, they are mostly looking for doctors who will prescribe their drug to their respective patients.

You can see how the smile fades a bit, when they notice my name tag says “PRESS,” or if they notice that the person they’ve wasted ten minutes gabbing with is a mere nurse, or even worse, the spouse of an attendant. And I’m not being critical. Many of these companies represented in the Exhibit Hall are helping to sponsor the conference, and in all fairness, a lot of objective information is reported. It really isn’t just a show for the pharm or medical device companies.

And yes, they know that I’m just wandering through to collect pens and cute items, and don’t have much interest in their merchandise. So I can understand that they don’t want to waste time talking to me, unless they’re really bored, or think that I might write a story about them.

Anyway, I’m having fun. I don’t have Internet service in my room–not even the ethernet cable works anymore. And to use the telephone, the Hilton charges $1.50 for a local call, and then begins to charge you per minute after 60 minutes. This is to ensure that you think twice about dial-up, which can turn out to be about as expensive as their wireless/cable hook-up–which doesn’t work in your room. It does work in the lobby, but big deal. There isn’t anyplace really comfortable to sit down there, except the Starbucks, and I don’t know if the Hilton’s wireless works in there–as it competes with Starbucks own system.

So my posts may be a bit irregular until I leave here. Then I’m going to Florida, where I only have dial-up, but at least, I’m not being charged beyond the local phone bill.