Greetings, editors!

Remember when you were little, and you'd go to the beach or pool, and one of your parents would pick you up and just fling you into the deep end? And it seemed like you submerged a long way down before you could go for the surface?

(Maybe it was just my dad who was insane like that ;) )

In any case I want to apologize for being quiet these past two weeks! I had a number of big projects all converge into a perfect storm. I was converting my home machine from a Vista machine to a Windows 7 machine. I was moving our server that holds our BellaOnline radio and other systems from Massachusetts to North Carolina. I was also starting up a full set of college courses at Northeastern, after a 20 years absence from school.

I underestimated how swamped I would be as a result!

Things are settling into place now. My home machine is 100% set. The radio server is 95% set and just needs some final cleanup. The Northeastern courses are all now "in motion" and have gotten past the initial "sheer panic" stage :) I've gotten through about half the backlog of editor messages.

I will ramp back up again with regular all-editor messages, so we all stay in touch!

CHICAGO

We've done a lot of collecting of ideas and plans for our upcoming Chicago gathering at the end of May! We're ready now to start solidifying things.

First, we need to know who is going to be there, and when, so we can make sure to account for everyone's interests and goals! If you're planning on going, please respond back to this message with:

* what dates you'll be there (and approx times if you know that)

* What your lodging situation is (getting a room at the Hilton Garden Inn Chicago OHare Airport, needing a roommate at the Hilton, staying elsewhere)

* Any dietary or other special needs we should plan for

* Your top 3 interests in sessions or activities at the Gathering

* Your cell phone # (we will ONLY use it at the weekend, only for urgent situations)

We chose the Hilton after searching the entire city of Chicago for hotels that matched the criteria the editors laid out for us (price being the top one :) ). It looks like a wonderful place! Airline rates have been quite reasonable, too, so if you've never been to a gathering before, this is a perfect one to start with!

Once we have that final list of attendees organized and posted, we'll brainstorm as a group to map out our schedule to hit every person's top interests!

I hope to see you there :)

Lisa Shea, owner
BellaOnline.com

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