Well it was looking very unlikely that I was going to make it to the MVP Summit in Seattle/Redmond in March (they occur about every 1.5 years) but I actually got approval today to be away from work for it so I can go. Cheer!
I am still working on getting approval to go to DEC in April. That one is a little tougher as there are more fiscal requirements that have to be answered. If I get to go, I will not be presenting this year. The non-swearing humorous English half[1] of the Dean and Joe Show is swamped with work so won’t be able to make it and quite honestly, the whole reason I presented last year was because it was with Dean. On top of that I am swamped with work as well which leaves no time to come up with a presentation and I am not doing anything cool right now that is worth talking about anyway… I would be watching all of the LongHorn presentations with just as much excitement as everyone else… I also don’t much like presenting and am not looking for name-face recognition because I prefer to be able to walk around and quietly pop into conversations without people realizing who I am. Of course I expect the mini-sessions that always seem to occur around me during the social events would still happen and I would help out as I can with the opening day workgroup session thing-a-ma-bob so I wouldn’t be entirely invisible.
Anyone who would truly love to see me at DEC that is signed up to go, please go beat on Gil at his blog or at the DEC Wiki. Anyone who isn’t signed up but will sign up if I am there (even though I am not presenting) also go let Gil know. 🙂 I will of course be working hard to get my employer to do the right thing and send me to the conference as training. Not many other places I can go to get advanced AD info other than at the summit and sitting with the actual DS Developers. Hmmm, in fact the only other place I can think of is from my friend Deano and truly, what can Dean teach me. 🙂 Just kidding buddy, miss you, wish you could make it to the summit. Also my friend Eric is presenting at DEC this year and I would truly like to see that. Don’t tell him, but Eric is a pretty bright whipper snapper. I would also like to see BrettSh at the conference but that would probably just be too much fun to watch. ;o)
joe
[1] Opposed to the devilishly handsome 100% red blooded American swearing half. 🙂
I didn’t go last year but I remember everyone on the message boards saying how great your presentation was with Dean. They should record those and sell a DVD for those of us that don’t go.
“I prefer to be able to walk around and quietly pop into conversations without people realizing who I am.” haha now that is just wrong. You should be wearing a joeware hat.
LOL. People aren’t as willing to talk when I stand there. I like hearing what people are talking about to hear what kind of issues they are running into.
Sweet. See you there!