I’ll be departing the Secular Student Alliance conference shortly, to spend most of my day traveling back home. I have to say a few things about it, though:

• This was a good meeting! What the student attendees get is some excellent training in how to organize and maintain an active student group, and it’s worth it to go. If you want to fire up a gang of campus freethinkers, you should think about coming next time.

• It was exceptionally well-organized: talks were paced well, everything was kept moving at a good clip, and plenty of time was left between talks for schmoozing. And the talks all started on time!

• I stayed in the dorms with the students, and it was an interesting experience. There was a time in my youth when I could stay up until 4am talking, too.

• The SSA is a great organization, but they’re hurting for money (like many non-profits right now). Maybe you aren’t a student, so you aren’t planning to go to their meetings—but that just means you can maybe afford to donate a few bucks to the cause.

For your entertainment, I’ll leave you with an example of one talk, by Hemant Mehta, who discussed something of importance to godless college students: dating. He has some tips here.

I told him he’s doing it all wrong. The best way is to pick the prettiest girl in your neighborhood when you’re in third grade, follow her around for 10 years or so, and then ask her to marry you after a few dates. It worked for me!