Why not pick *nice* places for the Usenix conventions?

[Brian Kantor]

dricejb at drilex.UUCP (Craig Jackson drilex1) writes:
>Actually, as I remember, the Town & Country is in an area called 'Hotel 
>Circle', which is a little valley which contains almost nothing except
>hotels & related restaurants, etc.  This means that there are lots of
>other inexpensive hotels nearby, but there's really quite a bit of land
>so that they're all separated by large parking lots.  Plus, half of the
>hotels are on the other side of a freeway.  I've only been at a Town &
>Country convention once, but I didn't consider the site memorable.

It's sort of central, and the smaller and cheaper of the two convention
centers in town.  There are lots of low-price motels around, restaurants,
and shopping centers, but the reason there's lots of land is that it's
really a usually-dry riverbed on the exit end of a 100-year flood plain.

Few who have moved into San Diego in the past decade or so realize
that that means, but I remember a 20-year flood that had more than 6
feet of water covering roads, basements, and other structures in that
valley.  Amazingly enough, people still build there and they still can
get flood insurance.  CAMF.  One of these days we'll get some rain,
and the dam will burst, and most of the contents of Mission Valley
will wash out to sea.  If only we could convince all the lawyers to
move their offices there first....
	- Brian