It’s been a long, slow, and overwhelming year. But here we are again, summer, time for an IAJGS conference. This is the Jewish genealogy conference.

This year, as in most, I’m a speaker. I got my videos submitted late, but they were done well. And now we’re in the midst of the conference.

Unlike the other major conferences, this one is longer. It was always longer in person, but even virtually, it’s longer. Because it’s international, it could go for more hours of the day, but they’ve scheduled short days. The first day, there was a very long lunch break. Who needs a big lunch break when we’re home at our computers? Not to mention, the international attendees aren’t staying up all night to watch the live lectures because they’re being recorded and play back on demand. But they could have the lectures going for longer days for the international people and the Americans could be watching those on demand.

I’ve attended some of the live lectures and a couple of the SIG meetings so far. Because everything is on demand, I can watch more lectures and I’m going to some of the beginner level or random topics just to listen in. This is better than the in-person conference, where I choose lectures more carefully and try not to re-learn old stuff or learn things that I likely will never need to know.

It’s not the same chatting with friends. I’m mostly chatting with the friends I’ve been talking with for the whole pandemic. But they’re good to talk to. At a normal conference, I’d talk to a lot more people, talk to people I don’t even know, go out to meals with friends and strangers. Virtual is still missing the social part of the conference. It’s more like having a pile of webinars all at once. But that’s not too bad either.

I just realized that I haven’t blogged in a long, long time. I thought I’d touch base, and IAJGS is a good excuse for a blog post. Maybe I’ll write more about the conference. But even if I don’t, at least my readers still know I’m here.