The SEA meetings typically involve the weekend before Thanksgiving and end on the Tuesday at the latest. It is Wednesday and I'm still in New Orleans. The story I heard is that the SEA had the Fairmont Hotel booked for the meetings but it didn't reopen after Katrina. Scrambling to find a spot, they settled on the Marriot but were constrained to a Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday-before-Thanksgiving meeting schedule. The last day of a conference is always poorly attended due to attrition but this one should win the prize. Many people went home yesterday and many more are going home today.
8:00 - 9:45: Natural Disasters and Weather - I always attend the disaster sessions, and sometimes present a paper. This is likely to be a poorly attended session with a perfect storm (gotcha!) of attendance reducing factors: a narrow topic, Wednesday-before-Thanksgiving, and 8:00 am. I may be the only audience member. 10:00 - 11:45: Teaching Economics - The teaching sessions are always interesting, for one reason or another. 1:00 - 2:45: There are a few sessions scheduled but I'm out of gas. I'm guessing I'll put together some combination of (a) explore New Orleans, (b) take a nap, (c) finish a referee report and (d) write a letter of recommendation. Or, maybe I can pull off nine sessions in three days by hitting the Public Economics session.
A few others and I chose to stay one more night and avoid the most dreadful travel day.
