David*Macinnis*Gill.com

1. Opry­land. Been there, done that, regret­ted it both times. The pho­tos of the place don’t do it jus­tice. Think: Jeff Fox­wor­thy and Larry the Cable Guy Build a Hotel. “Hey, let’s add on the to ho-tel and slap a roof on it and how about we run us a creek through and stock it with some fish and ducks. Now, that’s some good hunt­ing right there, boy. Aii­ight?”
2. Chris Crutcher is the con­sum­mate pro. Not only did he floor his audi­ence, he ended *exactly* on time after get­ting the old one minute note. The man must have a clock in his head.
3. Pat Hughes is hilar­i­ous.
4. The ALAN Work­shop needs a big­ger room.
5. Naomi Shi­hab Nye’s wis­dom and humor can make you for­get even the most bizarre break­fast menu imag­in­able (cream-filled toast, under-cooked link sausages, pep­pers, and red pota­toes).
6. Matt de la Pena is too damn hand­some to be this good of a writer.
7. Cyn­thia and Greg Leititch Smith are the dynamic duo of wri­ter­dom. They kept their wits and humor over five days of sign­ings, speeches, sup­pers, and schmoozes. Next time, maybe they’ll bring their capes.
8. Diane Tuc­cillo pulled off the super-human feat of plan­ning and direct­ing the ALAN Work­shop, which was made even more dif­fi­cult by the con­stant foul-ups and flubs by Opry­land staff.
9. Teri Lesesne really is the God­dess of YA, except at one point, I thought she was doing the Neo Matrix thing due to her Fri­day out­fit.
10. The ALAN Work­shop is still the best YA show on earth.
11. Edi­tors, writ­ers, and teach­ers get younger every year. Thank God, I never change.
12. The ALAN Board, offi­cers, con­sul­tants, and panel lead­ers did yeoman’s work hand­ing the sign­ing lines, last minute changes, dead bat­ter­ies in the mics, no-show lunches, no-show peo­ple, intro­duc­tions, ques­tions, answers, and impos­si­b­li­ties that become pos­si­ble– Wendy Glenn, Patty Camp­bell, Marge Ford, Christie Jo “C.J.” Bott, Con­nie Zit­low, Kay Smith, Jes­sica Mize, Bon­nie Kun­zel, Sheryl Rinkol, Pamela Sissi Car­roll, Melanie Koss, Pam Spencer Hol­ley, April Bran­non, Anjanette Dar­ring­ton, Kathryn Kelly, Joan Kay­well, Jim Blasingame, Lori Good­son, Scot Smith, Mary Arnold, Diane Mon­nier, Chris Crowe, Sunya Osborn, Alan Teasley, Ebony Thomas, Gary Salvner, Edna Weeks, Lisa Arter, and Diane Tuc­cillo (if I left a name off, let me know, and I’ll gladly add it.)
13. Plan­ning for ALAN 2008 began today.