Salt Lake City, UT, USA

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Snow, Supercomputers, and Steve Wozniak: My Wild Week in Salt Lake City

Picture this: It’s October, I’m leaving sunny Southern California in a T-shirt, thinking, Salt Lake City? Sure, it’s Utah, but how bad can it be? Fast forward to me stepping off the plane into what looks like a scene from Frozen. A lake-effect snowstorm had rolled in like an overachieving weather system, and I was dressed for a beach barbecue. Welcome to the Supercomputing Conference (SC)—where the servers are hot, but the sidewalks are icy.

The Flight: Shorts, Snow, and a Stranger’s Reality Check

Let’s rewind to the flight. I boarded in shorts, a T-shirt, and flip-flops—because in SoCal, October means pumpkin spice lattes and maybe a light hoodie. I settled into my aisle seat, feeling smug about my minimalist packing strategy.

Next to me was a woman dressed like she was about to summit Everest: boots, scarf, jacket that could double as a sleeping bag. She kept glancing at me, then out the window, then back at me like she was watching a slow-motion Darwin Award unfold. Finally, halfway through the flight, she leans over and says, in the calmest voice imaginable:

“You do know it’s snowing in Salt Lake, right?”

I blinked. “Snowing? Like… actual snow?”

She nodded slowly, the way you nod at a toddler who just asked if the moon is made of cheese. “Yes. Real snow. Falling from the sky. Cold. White. Everywhere.”

I laughed nervously and said, “Oh, I’ll be fine.” She looked at my bare legs, then back at me, and replied, “Sweetie, your kneecaps are going to file a complaint.”

The rest of the flight, she kept giving me pitying glances while sipping her hot tea like a prophet of winter doom. Meanwhile, I was Googling “Can you survive a blizzard in cargo shorts?” Spoiler: You cannot.

When we landed, she put on gloves and strode confidently into the snow like Elsa. I stepped out and immediately regretted every life choice that led me to this moment. My SoCal shorts were no match for Utah’s lake-effect snowstorm. I looked like a guy auditioning for Survivor: Arctic Edition—and failing.

Day 1: The Arrival and the Great Wardrobe Crisis

The first thing I learned? Utah snow laughs at Southern California optimism. I had packed light—jeans, sneakers, and a hoodie—because in SoCal, “cold” means 65°F and a light breeze. In Salt Lake, “cold” means your eyelashes freeze together while you’re Googling “nearest store that sells thermal underwear.”

I sprinted (okay, shuffled) to a local shop and bought the warmest jacket they had. It was neon orange and made me look like a traffic cone, but at least I wouldn’t die of hypothermia before meeting Steve Wozniak.

The Conference: Nerdvana in Full Swing

The Supercomputing Conference is like Comic-Con for people who think GPUs are sexy. Imagine thousands of techies geeking out over petaflops, quantum computing, and cooling systems that sound more advanced than NASA’s life support. There were booths with clusters so powerful they could probably predict your next bad decision before you make it.

I wandered through exhibits featuring AI models that could simulate climate change, storage arrays the size of small apartments, and networking gear that looked like it belonged on the Starship Enterprise. Every conversation started with, “What’s your compute power?” and ended with, “Have you seen the new exascale demo?”

Meeting Steve Wozniak: The Nerd Holy Grail

Then came the moment: Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, tech legend, and patron saint of geeks everywhere. He was giving a keynote on innovation and creativity in computing. His talk was classic Woz—funny, insightful, and sprinkled with stories about the early days of Apple when “cloud” meant something fluffy in the sky.

After the keynote, I got to meet him. I shook his hand and said something deeply profound like, “Hi, big fan.” He smiled, cracked a joke about how supercomputers today could probably run circles around the Apple II, and posed for a photo. My inner nerd was doing cartwheels. My outer self was trying not to look like a human traffic cone in my emergency snow jacket.

The Olympic Museum Detour

Between sessions on high-performance computing and quantum algorithms, I snuck away to visit the Salt Lake 2002 Olympic Museum. It was like stepping into a time capsule of athletic glory—medals, torches, and bobsleds that looked like they could double as rocket ships.

I stood in front of the speed skating exhibit and thought, These athletes glide gracefully on ice while I nearly broke my neck walking from the hotel. There was even a display about the opening ceremony, complete with costumes that made my neon jacket look understated. If you’re ever in Salt Lake, this museum is a must-see—especially if you need a break from talking about teraflops.

Hanging Out with the Utah Jazz Cheerleaders

Here’s where the story takes a turn from nerdy to surreal. One evening, the conference hosted a networking event at a local venue, and guess who showed up? The Utah Jazz Cheerleaders. Suddenly, my life felt like a crossover episode between The Big Bang Theory and SportsCenter.

They were friendly, funny, and somehow managed to make small talk about supercomputers without glazing over. One asked, “So what exactly is a petaflop?” I explained, and she said, “Wow, that sounds faster than my Wi-Fi.” We laughed, took selfies, and for a brief moment, I felt like the coolest nerd in Utah—still wearing that traffic cone jacket, of course.

Lake-Effect Snow: Nature’s Denial of My Packing Skills

The snow didn’t let up all week. Every morning, I’d peek out the hotel window and see a fresh layer of white, mocking me. Walking to the convention center was an adventure—ice patches everywhere, and me trying to maintain dignity while sliding like a penguin. Locals strolled by in sleek boots and stylish coats while I looked like I was training for an Arctic expedition.

Pro tip: If you ever attend a fall conference in Salt Lake, pack for winter. And then pack more. And maybe bring a sled.

The Tech Highlights (Because Nerds Gotta Nerd)

Aside from meeting Wozniak and bonding with cheerleaders, the conference itself was mind-blowing. Here are a few highlights:

Exascale Computing Demos: Machines so powerful they could simulate the entire Earth’s climate or render a Pixar movie in seconds.
Quantum Computing Panels: Where everyone nodded thoughtfully while secretly wondering if Schrödinger’s cat was invited.
AI for Science: Models predicting everything from protein folding to galaxy formation. Basically, AI is now the Swiss Army knife of research.
Networking Gear: Switches and routers that looked like they could power a small city—or at least my house during a Netflix binge.

Every booth had swag: T-shirts, mugs, and enough stickers to wallpaper a data center. I grabbed a tote bag that said, “Got FLOPS?” because nothing screams cool like floating-point operations per second.

Food, Fun, and Freezing

Salt Lake City surprised me with its food scene. I had killer burgers, craft beer, and even a sushi spot that didn’t terrify me (a win in a landlocked state). The locals were warm and welcoming—unlike the weather, which remained aggressively snowy.

One night, a group of us ventured out for dinner. We ended up in a cozy pub, talking about HPC benchmarks like they were sports stats. At one point, someone said, “My cluster hit 1.2 petaflops,” and another replied, “Nice, but can it dunk?” Cue laughter and another round of drinks.

The Nerd-Meets-Sports Mashup

The whole week felt like a mashup of worlds: high-tech computing by day, Olympic history and NBA cheerleaders by night. I went from discussing parallel processing to posing for photos with people who can do backflips in sequins. It was absurd, amazing, and exactly the kind of story you tell when someone asks, “So, how was your conference?”

Lessons Learned

Pack for snow. Seriously. Utah in October is not Southern California in October.
Never underestimate networking events. You might meet Steve Wozniak—or the Utah Jazz Cheerleaders.
Supercomputing is cooler than you think. And not just because the cooling systems could double as cryogenic chambers.
Traffic cone jackets are a vibe. Not a good vibe, but a vibe nonetheless.
Listen to the lady on the plane. She knows things. Important things.

Final Thoughts

Attending the Supercomputing Conference in Salt Lake City was equal parts geek fest and adventure comedy. I learned about the future of computing, met a tech icon, explored Olympic history, and somehow ended up hanging out with NBA cheerleaders—all while battling snow in sneakers.

Would I do it again? Absolutely. But next time, I’m packing boots, gloves, and maybe a sled—because if there’s one thing I learned, it’s that Utah weather doesn’t care about your SoCal confidence.