WordCamp Miami lights a fire

After a fulfilling and enlightening day at WordCamp Miami, I can’t help but use one of my favorite expressions: The event lit a fire under my butt. For the generously cheap $30 attendance fee, I was able to accumulate a list full of things I can’t wait to tinker and play with. The brain cogs are turning with full speed and the inspiration is flowing rapidly through my veins.

Pete Bernardo kicked off the day with a fantastic presentation about WordPress plugins.  I, along with most of the audience, were “ooo-ing” and “ahhh-ing” over some of the plugin demos he performed on the spot for us.  I found this presentation to be absolutely perfect for someone like me who is fairly comfortable with installing WordPress for client sites, but often hit a wall when it came to enhancing them with advanced features like forms and higher levels of user controls.  Thank you, Pete. Thank you, thank you. *Updated* Check out Pete’s presentation from WordCamp below.

WordCamp Miami 2010 – WordPress Plugins for your Next Project from Pete Bernardo on Vimeo.

We all felt like insiders during the “What’s Coming in WordPress 3.0″ session with Jane Wells of Automattic.  A cool new default WordPress theme and “The Merge” between WordPress and WordPress MU are on the horizon. Aside from that, hearing from a super well-versed user experience expert who happened to be a female among a sea of male developers was a breath of fresh air in itself. It led to an awesome brainstorming session between a few of us chicks in the group. Lori Todd wrote a fantastic wrap-up of what we took from that session and our goals moving forward.

Willie Morris tweeted a thought that was also one of my biggest sentiments of the day: It felt like being in college again.  Big lecture halls. Lunch on the lawn with friends. Note-taking.  It was a throwback to my days at UF and I was overjoyed that they chose to host the event on a college campus. There is no better way to foster higher learning than to put your attendees directly into that environmental setting.  Excellent venue choice (even though I hate the Canes. Go Gators!).

Another stand-out presentation for me was Tammy Hart’s session on using WordPress with clients. Amen. I’ve been looking forward to a presentation like this for the longest time because of my experience level. I hate the frustration that I get when potential clients bring me WordPress requests but I am unable to meet their needs.  Tammy’s session made me feel okay about that and gave me some guidelines about where to go to find solutions.  Aside from the tips that she shared (and there were many) I was more inspired by the presence and expertise of yet another female who has been able to build a successful business around WordPress development and maintenance with clients. She is also completely self-taught. My hat is off to Tammy.

As Lori said in her post, I’m really pleased that the organizers of this event decided to plan it separately from BarCamp Miami this year.   I recall last year being torn between several WordCamp and BarCamp sessions and losing out by having to chose.  The separate camp remedied that and because it was tailored to three different levels of interest, there was something for everyone.

Bravo to David Bisset, John Carcutt and the rest of the WordCamp organizers. The motivation from the fire that is now lit under my bum to get up and do something was worth every penny. See you all at BarCamp tomorrow!

Blog Highlight – Carl Zimmer’s Science Tattoo Emporium

Although I have none of my own (and this is when my friends would call me out for being all talk and no action about getting one), I’ve always been a little fascinated with people getting inked.  My mom got her first and only tattoo sometime when I was in middle school, a goldfish on her ankle with some little blue bubbles, and asked me to be her tattoo artist.  I also got a request from my sister to sketch a sunflower to use as a guide for her tattoo on her back.  And now I’ve been sitting on my plans to get a fleur de lis somewhere on my ankle for about two years but just can’t manage to take the plunge just yet.

But I digress.  Instead of stepping up to the plate, I get a big kick out of seeing other people’s tattoos, especially ones that take a step out of the box and hold a lot of personal meaning.  I don’t mean family names written in old english, or crosses, or tribal tramp stamps.

One of my favorite blogs recently is Carl Zimmer’s Science Tattoo Emporium, which lets readers with a scientific background who’ve got ink to go with it share their photos and passions for their profession.  I bet the tattoo artists who are approached by these guys get really excited to take a break from coi fish, lotus flowers and chinese symbols to bring these peices of art to life.  Check some out.

Carl Zimmer is a “science essayist,” and according to his own bio,

Zimmer contributes articles to the New York Times, as well as magazines including National Geographic, Discover, Scientific American, Science, and Popular Science. He also writes an award-winning blog, The Loom. From 1994 to 1998 Zimmer was a senior editor at Discover, where he remains a contributing editor.

Wine bloggers head to Twitter

Dr. Vino, of Dr. Vino’s Wine Blog (one of my favorite daily reads that doesn’t have to do with journalism), had some chuckle-worthy commentary on his reluctance to join Twitter.

I can’t decide if this is a revolution in micro-blogging or a complete waste of time. So far I’ve learned various things such as: one woman was PMSing, another guy hates his job, another guy just finished 18 holes of golf, somebody else is at the farmers’ market (BREAKING!), and yet another guy is pinging his DNS server or some such. I have revealed trivialities as my confusion thinking New York State cider was different from mere apple juice…(read more)

And whether or not he actually wanted to read about the lovely monthly emotional tribulations of said woman, he did. I guess that’s the point, stumbling across random ramblings and tweeting right back. The more people into the conversation, the better, I say! Follow me on Twitter.