melev

One part of MACNA that I know everyone loves is getting freebies from the various vendors. I think it's in our inherent nature to acquire stuff that didn't cost a dime, hauling our score back to the hotel room and eventually home. Being a vendor myself, I'm aware of these expenditures through research of what I might be able to dole out myself to visitors of my booth. I can assure you it isn't cheap, from the point of ordering the product to getting it to the show, paying union workers to place the boxes in your booth or on tables for excited attendees to take.

I've been to 13 MACNAs in a row now, and I'm more judicious about what I'd like to bring home with me. I've never gone to the conference with the singular goal to bring home livestock. When driving, you have that benefit of getting such purchases home affordably, storing them in a cooler. But when flying there is the issue of airline rules, TSA encounters, and just plain bad luck. I tend to breeze past the livestock vendors and focus on gear, because you can never have enough gear... but I digress.

Upon arrival, each attendee was given a bag filled with loot. Somethings more valuable than others, but that depends on the hobbyist. I love getting food samples, for example. I'll talk about that one day. I like t-shirts, but have a ton of them after all these years in the hobby. If I do get a t-shirt, it has to be the right size or I'd rather pass and let someone else have it. And by size, I want a medium. It's a personal choice that bugs a few of my closer friends, but bigger clothing does nothing to help me keep my weight in check.

Here's a picture of the stuff I brought home from MACNA, minus a couple of items.

On the right, you'll see four t-shirts I was happy to receive from ORA, Apex, Rod's Food and Live Aquaria. All great companies to boot. To their left is a dark black item. That's the new Maxspect RipTide gyre pump, which I'm privileged to beta test. A nice beer glass from HighDef Corals, because I needed one. Prodibio products to add to my stash for the next year's dosing, an official MegaVeggieMag from Two Little Fishies to replace the prototype I've been using for the past 10 months. Food from Instant Ocean, NewEra, Seachem, Hikari and Ocean Nutrition. And a small pack of ChemiPure Blue, great for those instant setup frag tanks at a Frag Swap to clarify the 10g's worth of water. A Proaquatic drink koozie, a floss pad, some Melafix and Dr Tim's First Defence, good for a small QT system. The koozie, that's for me.

The Marine Chips are great in the Eheim auto-feeder. They never clump up and resemble Fruity Pebbles to me, although I doubt they taste the same. During one of my laps through the vendors hall, I made it a point to let the guys at Instant Ocean know I was a fan of it, only to be told it is being discontinued. Noooo! He was nice enough to give me three more bags though.

Not pictured is the new Gryphon Band Saw I purchased. A club member/friend hauled it back to Texas in his truck since it was pretty heavy. You've seen the eels. I also brought home two corals. A micromussa mini-colony and some red-with-yellow-centers Goniopora. I also brought home a few extra copies of Coral Magazine that I'd acquired, which I've slipped into a few shipments lately as a surprise.

Even limiting myself, my suitcase was over the limit weight-wise. But I'm content to get what I need rather than collect a bunch of stuff I don't want. In the raffle, I entered for things I could use or have as a backup, rather than try to win something simple because it was 'grand'. Although I did try to win that trip to Fiji, like everyone else in the building. Maybe some day.