I was at a CIDR Access Committee meeting in DC a few weeks ago. We review proposals for genotyping or sequencing by the Center for Inherited Disease Research, a service funded by several of the NIH institutes.
We had to buy our own coffee.
It’s silly to complain. There was a coffee shop across the hall from the meeting room, and the coffee there was suitable.
But isn’t it silly to pay airfare for a dozen people for a 3 hr meeting and then chintz on the snacks? Apparently it’s a new government rule. (I’d thought the rule was maybe instituted following the GSA’s Las Vegas party, but it predates that.)
Without coffee, grant reviewing does not seem to go as well.