Today I had kind of an awesome day. I went to the house of sweden (which is kind of like...swedish embassy part II as there is already a swedish embassy....so maybe it's more...the swedish embassy's vacation house on the waterfront. either way, it's fricking *gorgeous* D and I listened to various swedes (true fact: swedish men age well. also true fact: swedish ladies....um....ehhhhhhh) It's also impossible for them to not sound happy while they're talking. Sadly, it's also hard for them to sound interesting. At least 30% of them. Also- you want to see super-white? Albino swede) discussing regional culture producing tourism and blah blah. There was a woman from americans for the arts who was very inspiring (she also mentioned Baltimore about 4 times and little hearts showed in her eyes every time she did so) I could have listened to her for hours. the guy who talked about how great it was to work with livenation to create an opera house, i was less than enthusiastic about. And when i posed the question to the panel "when you're courting big businesses to front the money for these cultural destinations, is thought given to the independant artist and concert promoter?" he didn't answer at all....then i kind of got a weird response from a guy from saint louis who....possibly in a patronizing manner, brought up an anecdote about a visionary woman artist and san antonio texas and recreating venice and how her idea was stolen by a drunk mayor who went to the river to pee, fell in, and got typhiod....i ...i didn't see the answer, but then the AftA lady stepped up and kinda answered my question, although i wanted smuggy smuggerson to uncross his legs and answer my damn question. whatever. there was red wine and brie afterwards.