OUTING 2011 -- UPDATED WITH A WINNER

YankeeFan: You mean Chicago isn't the draw I thought it would be and I might have been *alone* if I could still make it??

 

Pretty much. I figured Chicago was centrally located and a good draw.

Maybe it's me.

 

Two problems:

Economy. We didn't get a ton of people from outside the Cleveland area last year.

The Buffalo outing. A LOT of people on this board are in the Northeast, or at least that side of the Midwest. And a lot of them have already met each other. That falling on the same weekend was a bad deal for Chicago.

I still wish I could make it. I love Chicago and was looking forward to shopping. But the new house takes precedence.

 

Also with limited vacation days sometimes, it's hard to justify travelling far to meet people that you might only know from an online presence.

 

It's not you, man. You deserve kudos for taking the lead on this.

Timing just didn't work for me ... actually will be in Chicagoland the weekend before the planned SportsJournalists.com outing to stay/visit with family in the burbs.

It's fun to come back to Chicago, 15 years since I lived there, and be a tourist.

 

In my case, I've got significant concerns about whether I'll have a job two months from now, so as much as I've always wanted to go to Chicago, it's just not a smart thing for me to do right now.

Maybe it's also a product of the times. There was a lot more interest in outings and the like three, four years ago or so. Now it's hard to gin up the same enthusiasm. Maybe it's the economy. Maybe it's the rift. Maybe it's the fracturing of careers; whereas we were all journos or related to them a few years now, now a lot of us are in our post-journalism careers and it makes us less vested in things.

I had a good time at the outings (two official, one unofficial) I've been to in the last four years. But times change. Maybe it'll never be the same again. Which would suck, but it happens.

 

I buy into the economy and fracturing of journalism reasons, Meat. Add some nasty financial stuff here and there's almost no way. Worse, I've got a very good friend in Chicagoland who I'd love to see again.

 

Goes along with the fracturing of journalism, but furlough days really cut into a person's budget.

 

I'm fortunate in the sense that I just started a new job, so the economic future's looking bright. As soon as I finish moving, and getting settled, etc. And that's not going to happen before Chicago.

Maybe 2012?

 

If'n it ever gets assigned to Atlanta, I'm up to host. And living here, I'll be a more capable host than I was in Cleveland (though Joel Hammond gets 98 percent of the credit for Cleveland)

 

Ahhhh, Cleveland...that was a year ago this week. :'(

 

Cleveland was awesome.

Great times with some great people.