Today was the first day of the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference in downtown San Francisco. After three days of non-stop Tapemark Charity Pro-Am action, my co-worker Jake and I jumped on a plane at 9:30pm yesterday night and arrived here at 3am Minnesota time.

We are staying at a new hotel this year–the Orchard on Bush Street (about two blocks north of Union Square). The San Francisco Marriott was full, so we found this option on tripadvisor.com. The price was decent and so far I’ve been impressed with the room. Bit of a walk, but it’s not bad.

I woke up this morning at 7:30am and got in the keynote line. We were able to get in the big room and sat towards the back. Overall impressions? Not much new and no free iPhones. The “top secret” features of Leopard don’t seem that great, but maybe they will grow on me. I desperately wanted a new Finder and so far, I think it still falls short of the preciseness and time-savings features of the old OS 9 Finder. Absolutely hate the transparent top menu bar…

The rest of the conference is confidential, so I can’t speak to specifics of what I’m hearing. That’s usually when all the good stuff happens, though.

Tonight we have tickets to see the Giants play Toronto at the wonder stadium by the bay.