[ANNOUNCE] London Perl Workshop 2009: Update #3

[Mark Keating]

Greetings one and all(1)

In this update:

1. Call for Papers
2. t-shirts(2)
3. Sponsors and Saturday Evening Social
4. Pre-meet no-meet Mongers-meet meat-meet!

1. Call for Papers
Today marks the official end of the call for papers, and yes as usual 
(and I am sure many of you rely on this fact, it is a tradition or an 
old charter or something) there is to be a slight extension to the 
timelines. So submit away my pretties as the date has been extended for 
one weekend and a day. The closing date will be Tuesday 10th November 
and absolutely no later than that on pain of pain.

2. t-shirts
The London Perl Workshop has always been a free event and so year in and 
year out we faithful do attend but wear no spoils of knowledge at other 
conferences, there are no t-shirts to be auctioned at other YAPCs...but 
all that is to change. Run all of you as quick as you can, whether you 
attend or not, to this glorious location:

http://shadowcat.spreadshirt.co.uk/

For there you will find a whole slew of t-shirts to purchase and to wear 
on the day, save for future conferences, use a bandana to wave off the 
noxious fumes of a London Pea Souper (3), buy spares to trade at 
conferences or donate to auctions, etc.
The t-shirts come in a range of styles (both for males and females(4) ) 
and most are in a range of colours also. There is even two different 
logos for you to be excited by (the one with the camel will be Digital 
Direct Printing (prepared from a bitmap), the plain logo is Flex Print 
(prepared from .eps). My suggestion would be to order as early as you 
can to avoid disappointment in delivery (they use Royal Mail who are 
being somewhat variable of late even discounting the festive season that 
approaches.)

3. Sponsors and Saturday Evening Social
We have managed to attract another two sponsors to our wonderful cause. 
State51 will be donating something special (see next update ;) ), 
whereas Bytemark will be sponsoring the buffet at the evening social 
amongst other special things. This year will see a slightly classier 
style of nosh - how well you are all treated, free conference - free 
surprises (tba) - free prizes - free beer - free food, why I could 
almost add - free love - but that would be a step too far.(5)
So if you bump into one of our sponsors on the day, and they will be 
around, please shake them warmly by they hand and let them know how much 
they are admired.

Please note, I urge you one and all, to place your names in the 
appropriate place in the wiki if you are to attend the free beer/food 
event after the workshop. It would be good to have some ratio to gauge 
numbers by other than the guesswork we so often aspire to. No pressure 
but do it :).

4. Pre-meet no-meet Mongers-meet meat-meet!
This year's event will be held on the 5th November which makes me think 
that there will be a London Perl Mongers Social on the 3rds November. 
Therefore I urge all this year to treat that event as the ideal time to 
get to London for the Pre-Conference Meeting. it is certainly the event 
I will be using. I of course would not stop anyone from forming a 
heretics meeting on the Friday night but I shall perhaps skip that as I 
want to be tucked into bed and napping gently afore the trails, 
tribulations and joys of the following day.(6) Please feel free to use 
the wiki or this glorious list to arrange this.

That is all for this update. Look in your inboxes soon for the 
ultra-special edition Update #4 (with free letters).

TTFN

-Mark

(1) And a happy day of mourning for the passing of England's failed and 
often unsung hero: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Fawkes
(2) T-shirts - shock - surprise - horror
(3) I was up all night last night getting past the 50K word count for 
Nano (www.nanowrimo.org) so my marbles are a littler loose today.
(4) Please do not feel constrained by society, go with what you feel 
comfortable wearing, we will love you for it and perhaps offer you a 
slice of cake (see note 3).
(5) Love should always be given freely and I certainly do not endorse 
the payment for such.
(6) So I'll see you Heretics in the pub then :).

-- 
Mark Keating BA (Hons)          |  Writer, Photographer, Cat-Herder
Managing Director               |  Shadowcat Systems Limited
Director/Secretary              |  Enlightened Perl Organisation
co-Leader                       |  North West England Perl Mongers
http://www.shadowcat.co.uk      |  http://www.enlightenedperl.org
http://northwestengland.pm.org  |  http://linkedin.com/in/markkeating