The 2011 Northwest Freethought Conference was awesome! The workshops were quite informative, the speakers were incredible, the beer cold, and company was great. There is nothing like a room full of 200 people who are all atheists or close allies (American’s United, Secular Jews, etc).

Heck, I even got to go to the bar with PZ Myers, Hemant Mehta, and a bunch of other cool people. If you don’t believe me, I have twitter proof:

I also got to meet a few readers and people who have listened to some of my podcast appearances. It’s always nice to be able to put some faces and names to the void of lurkers.

At the Bar. PZ and Hemant were at the other end of the table and it was a loud bar, so for the most part I talked with those at the end I was at. I had a few cards I had made for the blog, and I whipped some out as we talked, Wesley looked at the URL and said, “You’re that DW!” Then he pulled out his camera and got his picture taken with me…my first ever fan picture! Very exciting!

If you’re an atheist and you haven’t ever gone to a conference, I highly recommend it. This was my first one, and I loved it. For those of you who are ex-Adventists, think of it as being like camp meeting, only better.