Tales from Exhibitors Hall

There are several types of booths in exhibitors hall. Among the groups that exhibit at the Joint Math Meetings every year are the following:

1) Commercial publishers
2) Academic societies (MAA, AMS, SIAM, ASA, etc.)
3) Various programs (Budapest Summers, Project NExT, etc.)
4) A few universities
5) Individuals and companies who sell mathematically inspired art, puzzles, t-shirts, etc.
6) An art gallery (ok, this seems like more of a compilation, but it's there every year, and it's usually pretty good)
7) The tourism bureau from the city hosting the JMM the following year
8) Navajo jewelers (yes, they really are there every year --- so presumably they are selling enough of their stuff to justify it)

This year, however, there was a booth in Exhibitors Hall for which my immediate reaction was WTF!: There was a booth selling a product to make one's fingernails harder.

On the subject of "awesome," one old guy at the conference was wearing a t-shirt that said, "I'm a better kisser than I am a mathematician." I was pretty amused by it, but there also seems to be a hint of desperation there.