Tonight is Blog out Loud, and I hope my readers and friends in the Ottawa area can make it out. I was thinking this morning about how a lot of bloggers are shy introverts – like myself, actually – and that makes it tough to talk yourself into an event like this. I don’t even take the kids to soccer, because the thought of standing on the sideline chatting with the other parents for an hour and a half at the end of a long day sounds too draining. Even though they are actually my friends, and even though I always, always have a great time when I DO go, I still think of social occasions with a big “ugh” and have to drag myself off the couch.
So I totally get how going to an event where there’s a big room full of people, most of whom you don’t know, can seem scary and tiring. And how it’s a hot day, and the kids are all wild and crazy, and you’ve had a long week. And how it’s so, so much easier to stay home and watch last night’s PVR recording of Dance! Show! than to get in the car and drive downtown where there are crowds and construction and finding parking is an epic adventure. I GET IT.
And if I am being completely truthful, if I didn’t host the freakin’ thing I’d probably stay home, myself.
But! It really is an amazing, wonderful, truly good time. You will laugh, and you will cry. You will meet some great people – trust me when I say, everyone I have ever talked to there has been outgoing and friendly and kind. It can be a moving experience just to be in the room with other people who like to do the same thing you do.
It is worth getting off the couch.
So I hope I will see you there – if you do manage to make it, be sure to find me and say hi.
TurtleHead 
I am so so sad I can’t go this year!!! Anyone who read my comment and is on the side lines about going… Listen to Lynn, it is an amazing event. I love reading blogs but I really love actually watching the authors of these words read them. It is often surreal, touching, funny and always amazing!
Yes! I will see you there, and looking forward to it. And I have a DD who will not only get me there but keep me there until my reading :P. Thank you so much for organizing this, Lynn. I can’t even imagine how much work it has been.
And, as I’m realizing more and more, it’s not the speaking so much as the schmoozing that scares me about this sort of thing. Like you, I can’t think of something worse than sitting on the sidelines of a soccer pitch making small talk. But Meena starts soccer this summer. And DH is even more introverted than I. I have a feeling I’m going to be the one to go. Do you think people will bother me if I have a camera stuck to my face the whole time?
Wishing you an amazing, wonderful, and truly good time!
Lynn, your post really resonated with me. I’ve been back and forth about going to BOLO for ages. I want to, but I’m SO shy. I just wish I hadn’t been baking all day (for a huge birthday celebration this weekend) because then I would have read this post earlier, gotten my butt in gear and with Baby Man along with me as a buffer, totally gone. 😦
And to think, next year I won’t have a Baby Man as a buffer. But here’s hoping I work up my courage in time for the 2013 edition.
Have a great time – I’m sure you will!!! And thank you very much for organizing this every year. Obviously it’s a great time for many, many people.
It’s great that you host BOLO every year, us Ottawa bloggers need events like this! 🙂
Having said that, I’m sorry I missed it this year, but we were packing and getting ready to move. But next year, I will definitely be there! 🙂
I went to this year’s BOLO event and I couldn’t hear most of the presenters in spite of only being a few tables away from the microphone.
The ones I could hear were somewhat insipid in that they didn’t give any fresh perspectives on life in O-Town.
This event seems to cater more to local bloggers who want to network with each other rather than serve as a showcase event of local blogger talent for the public at large.