10 Tips for Dadbloggers Attending BlogHer 2012

If you're not a parenting blogger, you may have never heard of the annual BlogHer conference, which is kicking off in two days.  Allow me to explain.

BlogHer conferences are where about eleventy-million ladies and maybe six or seven dudes get together in some glamorous location and talk about parenting and blogging and parentblogging and making money from all those things and also some stuff mostly about just being ladies in general.

Before the big conference every year, there are lots of blog posts and facebook status updates and tweets that indicate a high level of excitement and pants-peeing in the mom blogging community.  This post on Mom 101 includes a pie chart demonstrating the topics many lady bloggers are freaking out about, which mainly include clothing choices, collecting free merch, and the prospect of interacting with their blogging heroes.  Mmmm...pie.

I went to BlogHer last year, because it was just down the street from my house.  It was cool.  I met a lot of people and scored an electric nose-douche.  I screwed up and didn't pick up the bag of dildos that some of my friends got, though.  Still, mostly good times. 

This year the conference is in New York City, which is not such a bad place either.  I will be attending.  I'm looking forward to it.  I'm not freaking out so much, although perhaps I should be.

Maybe I'm just not freaking out because I'm a little sleepy and I have a lot of other stuff to be freaking out about at the moment.  But as a public service to any other dudes that may be attending BlogHer 2012, I'm going to try to muster as much panic as I can in order to fill in the blanks in this obligatory pre-conference list, even though you still have plenty of time to prepare.  Here goes:

The Tips

1. Plan your wardrobe so that you have one shirt for each day. 
2. Remember to put on the shirt in the morning, not in the evening.  That way, after you sleep in it, you'll have a fresh one to put on the next day. (Example: Put on blue shirt on Friday morning, sleep in blue shirt Friday night, put on yellow shirt Saturday morning, sleep in yellow shirt Saturday night, etc.)
3. You should have some pants too.  No one will look at your pants so it doesn't really matter if you sleep in the same ones every night.  I prefer shorts with lots of pockets.
4. Bring your analgesic of choice and some multivitamins.  There will be a lot of free booze but no free Tylenol.
5. You'll probably meet some internet famous people you've never heard of.  Pretend that you're really excited to meet everyone.  That way the famous people won't think you are a dick, and the nonfamous people will just think you're weird and who cares about them anyway.
6. You should, at some point, look at the schedule and figure out roughly where you're going to go when.  But if you don't get around to it, don't worry.  There are thousands of moms everywhere who will tell you what to do.
7. Be prepared for enormous--and completely empty--conference center men's rooms.  They can be a little creepy, so you might want to get a friend to go in with you.
8. You should probably get some business cards.  Everyone seems to have them.  Shit.  Maybe I can get some made in time for next year.
9. Don't be an idiot and stay in the hotel the whole time.  You're in New York City.  (Residents of New York City can ignore this.)
10. Bring a towel?  I don't know.  I needed something to make it an even ten.