Okay, I’ve got everything recorded in the appropriate posts as notes from the most excellent TEDx Lansing event today. It was a really great day with fantastic presentations. Tons of good thoughts and ideas for Lansing and all of Michigan. I certainly wasn’t perfect in recording things, whether omissions or inaccuracies, but I did what I could.

At some point, I’ll finish processing my overloaded brain and create some sort of reflections on the whole event. For now, this is just a one post to rule them all for the separate sessions. You can jump to anyone you’d like. Just click on “Session #” to see my notes. (I was going to use my original post for this, but that’s so two days ago now.)

Session 1

• John Hill – Affiliation Nation: Powering Up TEDx Lansing’s Interconnectivity
• Justin “Bugsy” Sailor – Road tripping: A journey of people
• Sam Singh – Seven Continents, Seventeen Months
• Allie Merrick – ARTiculation, the Art of Speaking

Session 2

• Bob Fish – Random Entrepreneurial Thoughts
• Erik Qualman – The Future of Social Commerce
• Patrick Retzer – Lifelong Learning from 10,000 Feet
• Ross Emmett – Innovation is an Act of Love

Session 3

• Bryan Ritchie – Dismantling the Shark Cage
• Karl Gude – Visualizing Information
• Mark Wilson – Fair Sins and Virtues
• Dirk Schweitzer – Genetic Genealogy
• Chip Brock – Mass Confusion: The LHC Challenge

Session 4

• Betsy Miner-Swartz – Be a Hero, Will You Save a Life Someday?
• David Murray – Michigan, Leading the FutureMidwest Movement
• Rory Neuner – Creating a Livable Lansing
• Matt Dugener – The Thing About Cheese and Underoos

Which presentation did you like or hate? For those not there, any you wished could have seen? Just post a comment here or on the specific session post. Let me know!

To that end, I am attempting to resurrect some of my social media outlets to build my personal brand. No, I’m not looking for a new job or plan on starting a solo business next week. I just buy what Gary has to say on putting yourself out there, so that’s what I’m going to do. We’ll see what happens. I’m already 10% of the way toward Gary’s recommended 50 blog post ideas for content, so I’ll be working on creating those and coming up with the other 45.

So, look out second half of 2010. You won’t know what hit you!

I must confess, the whole process of shopping for plane tickets happened much faster than I would have liked. It all took place within about 24 hours; definitely not my style of doing most things. But it was good for me, because that means I’ve already accepted that I’m not really going to be in the driver seat at any point in the planning of this. I’m just along for the ride… er, flight. All the same, we have the tickets now, and that’s extremely exciting. A trip to see the pyramids, the Sphinx and all the other ancient history and art located in that region has been on my list of “things to do” for quite some time. And having a “local” tour guide (Jill, and, more likely, her boyfriend Ali) for most of it will make it all the more enjoyable and flexible. Jill is already shopping for cruise ship tours that run down the Nile River to see the Valley of the Kings, Luxor and the like.

With a trip such as this, the plane tickets are usually the largest expense. However, my frugal mind is already tallying the other costs that are sure to incur. And, actually, I’ve already made the next purchase towards the trip: a small but hefty book on Egyptian art and architecture. Additionally, I’ve also begun researching new digital cameras, since we’ll certainly need to replace our now long outdated Canon PowerShot S40 before going. If I can effectively use my powers of negotiation, there might even be two cameras in our future. But that might be as likely as the Sphinx asking me a riddle while we’re over there.