Here we are in the first workshop and what do I find – I cannot connect to the wireless network. Immediately, a window arrives that I don’t understand, “Windows is disabling your network adapter.” I’ll use Word instead.

So anyway, I’m in the first workshop with Dannie Just, an interesting woman – a physicist, a writer undergoing deep analysis, exploding taboos. The biggest taboo in the past year she tells me has been exploding the taboo about therapy and payment for therapy.

Now we are looking at the content of the workshop. She is asking the question, “What would make the workshop successful for you?” and before that, Dannie feels there is another conversation in answer to the question,
“What do we have permission to do here?”

We’ve had the introductions. And how we want to use the time. She says only that there will be a ten-minute break at 9.50am and 10.50am. And we shall reconvene on the hour sharp.

Dannie says, "My disciplines are critical thinking and action research. I am a writer, I often think out loud. I am liberal and challenging in use of words and beliefs." Later, she apologises that her language is often littered with swear words.

An exchange with a young woman,
“You look curious?”
“I am wondering what will happen now?”
“What do you want out of life?”
“I don’t know?”
“Do you mind if I use this interaction to illustrate something?”
A hesitant yes.

What is your motive for coming to a workshop about creativity?
Yes, you are curious, but what is the motivation?
What do you dream about? What do you want to do with your life?

Well, I am up early and ready to pack my laptop away for the long journey. My printer is playing up, so I have carefully copied the ticket number into my notebook. I felt that really I should be doing it with a pencil stub, carefully licking the lead before writing each number.

I have chosen my workshops for tomorrow. I thought it would be hard, how would I choose between so many interesting titles. But then it was easy ...

Creativity Utopia Workshop

"Let us start with the truth, the naked screaming truth. The creative do not care about creativity, they simply create... "

Yes, I like that idea. I've been immersed in creativity since October (before then I didn't know it was anything to do with me).

But then, I read,

"... For me the past year has been one of exploding tabus. Yes, exploding tabus. Your mileage may differ, but I on my part have found no other way to deal with tabus. ... "

Hmm, I love destruction :)~

" ... Utopia, on the other hand is the divine soup from which our dreams are made of. Utopia is the primordial soup of imagination and limitation. Utopia is paradoxland uncharted! ... "

... primordial ...

"... In this workshop we will explore tabus, utopias and forget creativity."

I can do that!

And after that I read,

Industrial IdeaProduction or «Why is "Dare to Share" the key to reliable innovation?»

Samuel Mueller = "hopelessly infected with the idea virus and eager to recklessly spread it around."

Who could resist?

I was delighted that two people contacted me through my last post! It's difficult, sometimes, to start writing in these things, and so pleasing when there's a response.

I'm also pleased that, through one of the replies, I discovered two other people that I've met previously. Hmm, it's beginning to feel exciting!

It occurred to me at the end of last week that I really ought to sort out my travel arrangements to LIFT08 and, possibly, a hotel as well. I sat down on Sunday with good intentions, but after forty minutes of careering between the LIFT maps and the online hotel booking service (never mind a flight), I was hopelessly lost and frustrated.

Never mind, I thought, I'll go to the Co-op Midlands Travel shop in my local town shopping centre (Oadby, in Leicestershire). You do have to have a certain mind set when approaching a travel agent, I find. It's a bit like estate agents and shopping for clothes at T K Maxx. It's not a five minute job that you can fit in between buying some milk and posting a birthday card.

You have to put aside the afternoon and accept that you may not do anything else with that half-day. Once you've entered that zen-like state, the whole thing becomes easier to bear, and you can pass the time gazing idly out the window or pretending to plan your dream cruise around the Mediterranean, while really eavesdropping on other people's conversations.

It was just as well that I had mentally prepared myself, as the people in the travel agents had had a bad day of it. Not only had they been so busy that they hadn't had time for a cup of tea (never mind lunch), they had had unfortunate news about next year's sales targets. I had thought 4.00pm on a Monday afternoon was a good time to pick, "they can't be busy then", but no.

Finally, I was the last person in the shop, and cup of tea in hand (we all had one, I thought it was really nice of them to make me one), we discussed my requirements. It took a little while, but eventually I had the hotel I wanted (near the conference centre, internet connection and free travel pass), the flights at the times I wanted from the airports I wanted and all for the best price!

I've just posted about my first experiences using Twitter http://tinyurl.com/2vgdwl