Highlights of the conference:
-The networking app has an entire thread for people to show off their animal tattoos, further proving my idea of "Newt Geiszler is the best marine biologist representation"
-Aquarists are all introverted weird fish people and the organizers know how to fix this for networking: Big name tags with your location/job, and so. much. alcohol.
-No you dont understand every night has involved endless free supplies of local craftbrew beer and wines.
-One lady who is a damn lead supervisor at her facility meandered up to me to tell me she liked my bowtie, then she formally stuck her hand out and went "hi Im -name- Im an aquarist" I got to see her freeze, hand still out, eyes widening in horror at realizing we're all fucking aquarists. You could see her deep soul shaking wish to be consumed by the ocean that she so loved in that moment. I responded with "oh my god IM AN AQUARIST TOO!!!!" We are all so awkward.
-Had a very alcohol-influenced in depth discussion with a lady from Monterey about nudibranch penis fencing and the two of us basically kidnapped this poor random bypasser to teach her about all the ways fish change their sex. I dont know if the woman was legit interested or was too scared to try and escape these two petite fish weirdos who were very passionate about Weird Freaky Ocean Sex
-Had another beer influenced conversation with one of the industries lead coral scientists on the long term effects of being raised Catholic and what being taken to confession at age 8 fucking does to a kid. "Thats why we're all so damn anxious"
-I used to volunteer at the National Aquarium in Baltimore (long time blog followers may remember). The damn curator recognized me and came up to ask how Ive been (he was my main reference that got me this job) and it was the weirdest damn moment because I kept remembering how much I SHAMELESSLY SUCKED UP TO HIM for them good reference points and here he was with crooked sunglasses absolutely HAMMERED.
-My boss is notorious. He does have a dry, sarcastic sense of humor and has declared himself "the coral god" of the industry but I had no idea the breadth of what I can only call a Fond Infamy he holds in the industry. I just say where I work and people KNOW. Reactions range from a knowing grin of "how's that going for you" to "oh you work for -name-??? Yeah Ive heard of him he's a crazy man!"
Apparently my boss got banned from MACNA, the annual hobby-based aquarium conference. When I asked him he shouted "BECAUSE I TOLD A FUCKING JOKE" and would say no more. I can only get whispered bits of it. His banning is legendary. It is the thing of fables. All I know is his presentation was called "How to be an Aquarist" and was, and I quote: "12 solid minutes of crude, filthy humor presented at a family conference."
His status of legend was solidified when, in what one curator called "the ballsiest move Ive seen" the next year he came to RAW (this conference im at) and went "you may have heard MACNA banned me. They did. Here's why" and gave THE EXACT SAME PRESENTATION
-Remember the octopus button up I had in that selfie a few days ago? I wore it to a networking event (aka the conference bought out a brewery for the night and let us loose on endless beer). Two dudes also wore the same shirt. Of course we're all GPO keepers. You could find the octo keepers by all the octopus themed clothes and jewelry.
-A poor animal handler designer from Denmark fucking dying and slowly melting in the florida heat. Last seen rapidly fanning himself and going "oh yeah this is the latest in Dutch air conditioning"
-overheard "nonono shhh you're with friends you can say it. We all know, it's safe. Sea turtles are all fucKING ASSHOLES"
