This morning started early with a wake up call so I could be ready for the AGM of the BCCA in the main conference room in the hotel. The meeting is a chance for me to hear all about the back room workings of the club and to find out how the club has gone over the past twelve months in many areas including financial, membership, marketing etc.
The meeting runs for just over two hours and also handles voting in of new board members, news on future Canventions, award winners for magazine presentation and awards to the international attendees, which I received personally and also for the people who attended last year’s Canvention when they ran out of plaques to present to the international attendees.
At the end of the meeting I had to pay the chapter fees for the Kangaroo Chapter which I am the president, this saves me having to pay them by post later in the year.
Once the meeting was completed it was again time to head over to the main convention center for more walking around to try to find some more good buys for my collection. This is not as easy as it sounds as people do not have many Guinness items available.
I did not find anything in the next two hours but did as always get to spend time with many collectors who wanted to talk about the hobby and as they all do talk about Australia. I think we should get some help from the tourism board for all the promoting we do.
By this time it was lunch hour so a quick trip to the concession stand was taken before I took my turn helping to look after the Aluminum Bottle Chapters’ information table. The table has information about the chapter, chapter merchandise for sale, takes membership applications/renewals and sells raffle tickets in the big chapter raffle that has over 50 prizes. People are rostered on to man the table for one hour periods in pairs to assist in promoting the chapter and raise monies to keep it running.
After my hour was over it was back to walking around the trade floor before I ducked off an hour before it closed to go back to the room to try to get some sleep and rest up my legs which have become very sore from walking around so much on concrete floors and from the rash on my legs from the campground at Bristol. I managed to get my head down after setting my alarm for two hours time.
Woke up and got ready for another Chapter meeting, this time for the Rusty Bunch Chapter which is the group I spend time on their message board reading and corresponding about beer cans and other things. These guys are great for information on everything. I told them about my trip this year and 5 or 6 guys offered to help me out by arranging accommodation, visiting their homes, information on cities and information on my Nascar experience.
As you walked into the room there was a giveaway of a free chapter glass and also a ticket in the lucky draw for attending the meeting. Although I did not win either of the two draws it was a great incentive to attend the meeting. The actual meeting kicked off at 6pm and was a nice quick one, new officers were elected and everyone introduced themselves to the meeting. We also had to mention our website ID names and it was good to put faces to names you talk with on the message board.
The chapter offered free bottled beer to those present; luckily I knew this so I bought some soda for myself. At the end of the meeting dinner was provided in the form of pizza and chicken wings, which there was more than enough off.
Following the meeting I went up to my room to drop off the glass and take a shower before preparing for the evenings events. There are two parties on the Friday night; one hosted by the Jersey Shore Chapter is always a themed night, with this year’s theme being a pirate night. There were some great costumes amongst the crowd. The Jersey Boys dress the room up appropriately and provide free drinks and finger food for the masses and a disco DJ provides the music.
The other party is put on by the Rusty Bunch chapter and is a rock night. Quite a few of the members are really good musicians and they play rock music all night. This year was very well organised and the play list was very good. There is enough musicians present that they can sub in and out during the night so that we get different players and they all get a good break from playing.
It was a fantastic night of entertainment and when I left for bed at 12.30 both parties were still going strong.
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