I'm famous!

In case it's escaped anyone's attention, I have a fairly distinctive look. It's also been remarked upon that I'm not entirely shy of a crowd and have been known to exhibit certain exuberant eccentricities - especially when I've been drinking. Another side effect of drinking is memory blur and loss, which can then lead to certain awkward social moments when folks remember me, but I have no idea who they are.

Most of these occurrences are fairly average, such as people saying hi to me in shops or people I meet through work saying "You gave me a presentation a couple of months back...", but there have been a few of interest recently - I'll share some:

1. T.V.
Quite some time ago, I appeared on a daytime T.V. quiz show by the name of Brainteaser (now closed down due to legal scandal).

Plenty of people at home and University recognised me and came up to me afterwards (proof, if ever it was needed, that students just sit around watching rubbish on TV all day) - but a particularly disturbing moment was experienced a fair few weeks after the programme aired, in a pitch-black nightclub in Manchester, at 3am, when two chaps came up to say they recognised me.

If that's not strange enough, I should point out that I dressed casually and fairly 'normally' for the show. In Manchester, I was wearing a dress and make-up (don't ask):


_{Ducky says hi}

2. U.S.A.
Under the guise of work, I slipped off to Seattle earlier this year for a Microsoft internal conference. There was lots of drinking along the way, but one particularly memorable night was the main party. I was on stage twice at this party - once jamming with the house band (fairly sober) and once dancing with a tambourine (less sober).

Videos of this (fairly extended) moment exist, and I'm sure the image has stuck in many a Microsoftie's mind and will be firmly rooted there, as the one lasting memory they have of the conference. It was still quite a shock last night though when someone with lots of neon on grabbed me just as I was finishing some tequila and shouted "You were awesome in Seattle".

It took me quite a while to discern what on earth he was on about, and how he knew (of) me.

3. W.O.G.s (Weird Oracle Girls)
I get a free bus from the office back to my house on the rare days I'm actually working in Reading, and this gets quite crowded around 5.30. Twice though, earlier on, when the bus was empty, a girl has gotten on from our neighbours Oracle, and sat right next to me.

Sure, you think, it's just my sexual magnetism - not so. Possibly. The first chatted away to me for quite a while, which was lovely, and seemed to know quite a bit about me. I couldn't place her though until she walked halfway to my house, and then turned off a side-street saying "See you Tuesday". At this point I still thought she was some crazy stalker, until Julie suggested she might be a girl I dance Salsa with on Tuesdays.

However, the second W.O.G. still remains a mystery to me. Likewise, she sits and talks to me, and it's gotten to the point now where I can simply reference other bus conversations and look like I know who she is. I just wish she'd wear a name badge on the bus one of these times - I really would like to know how she knows me.

Dancing on the tables

So as I've mentioned, I spent the a while last month over in Seattle, working away studiously. I must admit however, that there was the odd night out drinking along the way. Every night, to be perfectly precise. I won't bore you with stories of under-dressed women dancing on the bar and riding bulls, nor will I draw out the mundane tale of the Scotch Whiskey vs Bourbon challenge.

Instead, I'm just going to tell you about one particular night. Thursday night. This will probably be a long post, but I promise it'll be worth it.

I've had this post written a while, but was waiting on the videos I reference below. Still no sign of them, but when I get them, I'll put them up too. Maybe.

Things started well, as per usual, with a small trip to the hotel bar of The Westin, where I was staying. Aside from having the slowest cocktail-making barman east of Finland, this was fairly unremarkable - although they did insist on ID'ing me every single time I went there (night after night), even when I was only buying a hot chocolate.


_{The Westin - I don't remember it looking quite so technicolor}

After that we jumped on a coach and headed off to the TechReady Party - which was hosted on the dockside, in a large warehouse. Given that the attendee list featured around 5000 men and two women, and that warehouses aren't famed for their heating or comfort, you could be excused for thinking this wouldn't be much of a party.

If you needed any more convincing, then looking at the 'map' given out at the start (four Space Zones (!!) ) would have been enough to send anyone of a weaker will packing. I stuck to it though, and made my way through to the karaoke section - to hear a fully international audience united in their love of butchering classic songs. You've not heard 'Smoke On The Water' 'till you've heard it in an odd Russian accent.

Once my ears had bled enough I headed on through to the Lunar..something...whatever - where the Randy Oxford Band were playing some of their own stuff, and hosting a jam night. There wasn't much I could play (no trumpet, keyboards far too quiet...) but I did feel it my Gallic duty to join in somehow, so I decided to have a crack at playing one of the lovely basses on stage - albeit, upside down, as they only had right handed basses. Some guys I was with were nice enough to take a video:

--

[I'll add in the video when I get a copy, sorry folks]

--

Now, videos when I'm sober are fair enough, in fact - they're encouraged. The problem is - just like the rest of the week, the alcohol was all free, and freely flowing. The difference this night though, was that a very nice waitress had latched herself onto our group.

At first, she brought us all a lovely fruity cocktail - which was very pleasing and tasty, and was consumed pretty quickly. As she offered us another one, one of the fellows I was with remarked "..but could you make it a bit stronger this time?". Everyone laughed, and she did so. Then she offered us another drink, and remembering the laughter he said the same again. And again. And again.

An hour, maybe two, passed, and the night was drawing to a close. The jam session had mostly ended (although a couple of stragglers were still up on stage with the main band) and anyway...I was a little too tipsy to play most instruments. There was however, one instrument I could still play - and it was one small enough that I could also indulge my itch to dance (with a 99:1 male/female ratio, they'd decided not to include a dancefloor):

--

[I'll add in the video when I get a copy, sorry folks]

--

At some point after this video was taken, one of the band was heard to state "Get on out there and get them going" to me. Naturally I took this to mean "Go and dance on the tables", which undoubtedly was a good idea in front of all of my peers and colleagues. Seemed to go down well anyway. Also, for the record - I did NOT kick that speaker off stage. It fell. And it was fine anyway.

At some further point the party ended. Or, everyone pretended it was over so I'd leave...either way - we got a coach back to the hotel. On the coach I got a phone call from my team-mates to tell me that they'd had enough, and were 'quitting' - so I thought to myself 'I suppose midnight's late enough...up at 7am tomorrow to see Bill Gates talk anyway'...and made my way up to my room, undressed, and got into bed.

Five seconds later, I got another phone call, which as far as I can best transcribe, went something like this:

"AAahf we lof gooo noawnaaa tohoooash ooo ahod a [and on]...Hello, sorry, I think he's a bit drunk. We're outside the Westin if you fancy coming out"

"Sure", I said, "wait there for me" - and got out of bed, got dressed and popped outside. They were nowhere to be found. I tried ringing the two guys I knew were out, got no reply, send texts, got no reply...and decided to give up again.

This time I got as far as the door to my room before my phone rang again - they were at a bar just around the corner. I popped along there where I met a bunch of Brits, and a Polish chap I'd met on my trip to Prague a few months back, who was also out drinking.

We had some more drinks, and eventually moved on to a bar which, eerily, had no discernible name. In there, our Polish friend hooked up with a lovely looking local with very nice breasts in the time it took me to order a drink and blink a couple of times. Someone called over to me:

"Hey, he works fast"

In no time they had their arms around one another, and were soon kissing and swapping various fluids at the bar. It wasn't long - mere minutes in fact - before they were polishing off their drinks and leaving together. I shouted over the bar to one of the fellows we were with:

"Bloody hell, she was keen"

The barman overheard this little exchange and looked towards the door with an amused grin on his face. He turned to us and said:

"He didn't just leave with him did he?"

"Him?"

"Yeah, that guy's been hanging around here for months, trying to pick up men"

Well, we tried to get out and save our Polish friend, but he was already long gone. I sent a text message...it may even have arrived in time. We didn't see him again that night - and he was reluctant to talk about it afterwards.


_{I don't have a picture (or memory) of the guy/girl, so here's an artist's impression.}

You might think that, with 2am (the time when Washington state shuts down) swiftly approaching, a 7pm start that evening and a 7am start the following morning, we'd take this experience as a cue to go home. If you think that, you're probably not British.

After some cajoling the barmen told us that they did know of one place we could go...a club that stayed open till 6am - perfect! And when we got there I was extremely pleasantly surprised to find a buzzing dancefloor, a well stocked bar, and plenty of women lounging around - some less dressed than others.

Well, we paid our $5, and entered - getting a lovely stamp that wouldn't wash off. After gravitating towards the women who looked lonely, and in need of some company, we popped over to the dancefloor. A short time stumbling around there left us thirsty, and so we gathered together and popped along to the bar, and ordered our various drinks.

The reason, it soon became apparent, that Washington closed down at 2am, was that no-one can serve alcohol after 2am. So we had five Red Bulls instead. Things got quite surreal after a while - with a club full of drunken people dancing away at 3.30/4am, all with soft drinks in their hands. I'll never forgot the girl slumped, semi-conscious at the bar, holding a glass of orange squash.

That Bill Gates speech the next day by the way? Great - although I wasn't really up for breakfast beforehand.

I Hate America

Lots of people make this claim, but mostly they're just basing it on some trivial little thing, like wars, foreign policy or unbounded capitalism. They probably don't even care too much - I mean, look at this chap:



He just forgot to bring his jacket along for a day of standing on the street corner, and wanted a bit of warmth. Then the media got involved and suddenly he had to start pretending he had some problem with the USA. Then you've got these fellows:



This was originally reported as an 'anti-America rally', but if you look closely, you'll notice that the guy in the foreground is actually making a 'scissors' motion. He's about to stage the grand opening of a much needed Gilette shop.

--

Back to the topic I, on the other hand, have a perfectly valid and, quite honestly, shocking reason to hate the Americans. I took the novel approach of 'walking' (walking, noun: the act of travelling by foot - I got that definition from an online, American dictionary. They'd spelt 'travelling' wrong) from place to place in Seattle.

I soon noticed, as I 'walked' about the place, that they were big fans of traffic crossings. Well, you'd have to be really when it's impossible to walk more than 50 metres or so in any direction without encountering a road. Such big fans, in fact, that they had three different variations on images for the 'stop' and 'go' paradigm, which as far as I can discern, all meant exactly the same thing.

One of these types was the familiar 'red hand' and 'white man':


_{Colour's a bit off in this pic, you'll have to trust me that the man at the bottom is really 'white'}

This is quite an interesting picture if you actually analyse it a bit. You'll notice the hand is designed very clearly to convey a message of 'stop'. You may think the colour red is designed to do the same, but if you think carefully, you'll realise that what Americans really associate the colour red with is...communism. So, the top of this sign is really saying "STOP COMMUNISM" every time you cross the road.

I hardly think I need to point out the implications of 'progress for the white man' to anyone with a brain either. Shameless subliminal messaging from the American government there.

That's not why I hate America though.

The reason I hate America, is another type of pedestrian crossing sign you'll see over there:


_Bastards.

Yes, the infamous "Don't Walk" sign. Or, actually, if you take a good look at it, the "Dont Walk" sign. What the hell is a Dont? Every single day, every single American (well, those that go outside...so probably more like 50%) is being exposed to a horrific violation of the English language - it's little wonder that in a word association survey 'stupid' recently came pretty high when people were asked to associate something with 'American'. British people, that is, obviously - not American ones. Can't find the source for that survey at the moment, I believe it was on BBC News, let me know if you have a link.

Finally, two more pictures of something from my little Paris trip that never made it up:



Something that classy makes it hard to hate France, doesn't it? I still manage that feat though, fortunately for all.

TechReady6 is over!

I'm finally home from Seattle, and just a little jet-lagged, but it's certainly been a week to remember. I've been out there attending TechReady, a Microsoft internal training conference, and I've had such a brilliant time.

As well as speaking to and hearing from lots of guys in various product teams (the ones who write Windows, Office, Visual Studio etc etc) I've also had a chance to meet loads of other evangelists from around the world - all of whom are also doing cool stuff and playing with great toys.

"Blog about the conference, don't blog about the content" was a guideline given out that I'm unfortunately going to stick to, but believe me when I say there's a hell of a lot of really cool new MS stuff coming out both soon, and longer term. Keep an eye out for some of the amazing stuff being announced at MIX08.

Also keep an eye out for some beautiful announcements coming from Adobe around that time-frame too. TechReady wasn't just about Microsoft technologies you see - we also need to know what's happening all over the industry if we're to do our jobs properly. As a result, I'm now a complete fan of Ruby and Adobe AIR too - can't wait to get some free time to start writing some code with those two. If you're into coding, buy me a drink sometime and I'll talk your ear off about those two :)

More posts to follow about various fun in Seattle, going to have a nap now I think, then resume trawling the pile of emails that built up in my absence. A teaser for now though...one of my draft posts is currently called 'Dancing on the tables' - and I've left space in there for a video...

Xx

A quick hello from Seattle

This trip in one word:

Unhealthy

I'm not sure I've eaten a single vegetable since I arrived here. I'm becoming swiftly addicted to American junk food. I spend the entire day (8-6!) sitting in sessions, watching cool people presenting about ultra-cool stuff. I then pop back to my hotel room for all of...fifteen minutes or so. After that it's time to go out for another inordinately unhealthy (but gorgeous) meal, and lots to drink.

I'm sure something happens after that too, but I have no idea what. Then it's back up at 7.30am to start the whole thing again. The only exercise I get is moving between bars, or walking from the hotel to the convention centre and back.

I choose to walk despite the fact that my hotel's one of the ones on the 'shuttle bus' route to the convention centre. Only the ones which are close enough to walk don't get a shuttle bus service. I'm so hardcore I walk it anyway - though it's such a dissapointment not being "so near the hotel that shuttle transport will not be provided and taxi fares will not be reimbursed" as you can clearly see below:



Picture taken from Live Maps' directions from the hotel to the convention center centre.

Off to Seattle!

Well, just finished packing, and I'm off to Seattle tomorrow morning, where I'll be seeing all the coolest MS stuff and generally having a good time until the 17th.

Try not to miss me too much...

Xx

On the road again

Sporadic blogging on my part is generally due to one of two reasons - either I'm doing very little of interest, or I'm doing a whole lot of fun stuff.

This week, I'm happy to say, has been the latter. I've been filling in for someone on the Inspiration Tour - a set of three hour presentations to students, with the aim of getting them enthused about technology in general, and showing off a heap of cool Microsoft stuff along the way. I was around to present on all the cool stuff in Silverlight - though I also gave a hand with XNA, and then with general questions on .NET and anything else which came up.

Yesterday I had the fun of presenting to a couple of hundred folks at my own University (Aston) which was great. I resisted drawing the New Aston Logo during a demo where I happen to say the line "obviously, you can see I'm not an artist in any way", as I was wearing my Microsoft hat, but it was very tempting. They've got the logo up outside the main building now too, and it looks simply horrible. I cried inside.

Things went pretty well there, people seemed to enjoy themselves and feedback scores were pretty high - with some nice comments left about me (apparently I 'captivate the audience', don't you know). However, they could have gone a lot better - because although I, and the other guy filling in, really knew our stuff, we hadn't presented it to students before - and I'd not really spent much time with the slide deck and demos I was using.


_{Some might question the merits of my 'standing in the centre of the audience' presenting style. But it gets results.}

Today, on the other hand, over at Brunel University, went superbly - everything was smooth and slick and polished and feedback scores were through the roof. The half hour for Q&A at the end over-ran and we managed to handle all the tricky and technical questions superbly, if I do say so myself. And if I don't say so myself, the feedback forms certainly do.

Newport tomorrow, for the same gig, and then I'm done with that forever - which is a bit dissapointing, but given that I'm writing this from the office, having just finished a 'day's work - I won't be sad to see the back of this and have enough time to keep up with my day job.

Oh and Friday? Off to Seattle for 10 days with work. Things might be a bit quiet around here whilst I'm out there, but I'm sure I'll spam you once I get back.

Xx