Tonight was our holiday party for SBMA. Was very fun and festive. Everyone seemed to have a great time. I was lucky enough to find some antlers from a friend (Thanks Paul and Lynne!) so I could bring some holiday cheer. Georgia did a great job at putting the whole party together as the setting was perfect and the food was very yummy (Thanks to Secret Ingredient..our Museum Cafe). I got the privilege of doing the introduction for our Director Larry, which was fun and spontaneous…all I gotta say is the antlers definitely help break the ice at parties.

Jimmy and I (rolling with the antlers), click to view more

Just browsing our servers today and looking at the task managers on each. I love having powerful servers. Below is a screenshot from our server hosting SQL Server 2005. It is a dual quad core Xeon E5420 @ 2.5 GHz, giving a total of 8 cores. Loaded up to 4 GB of RAM…it pretty much just sails away with Christopher Cross. Our file server is a similar setup. Good stuff!

8 Cores (2 quad core Xeons)

With our new estore launch at work (www.sbmastore.net), I have been researching a way to photograph our products. I have finally found the solution! It is called Mr. Ezcube and is simply the most amazing product ever. The package comes as a kit and comes with two cube tents (12″ and 30″), two side lights, and one top light. Our biggest issue was lighting and the ezcube has solved that for us! The product shots may not be quality for publications, but for our estore, it is perfect.

Me and Ezcube (not a hip hop artist)

Been away at the Windows Connections conference that I go to every year. It is put on by Dev Connections and has various tracks on Exchange, Windows, SQL Server, SharePoint, Office, etc. For me, it is a week long of training on various topics and is really the only formal training I get all year. Helps me mentally prepare for what is coming in the future and for things I could and should be doing now in my current setup. The conference started on Monday, 11/10 and ended Friday 11/14. Time is from 8 - 6 daily, so it is a pretty long day of constant information flow.

John’s Posse (sounds strange, I know) was in full effect as usual. We all hang out after the conference and catch up on everything from tech to life. I also got the surprise of Steve from Acuity-VCT being in Vegas at the same time as he was on vacation. Had dinner with him and his wife on Wednesday evening. Tried to go to Steve’s favorite Chinese restaurant, but everything was closed. Odd that we could not find ANY chinese restaurants to eat at on the strip! MacGyver was in full action as normal (he even fixed the plane he was on).

I also missed the big fire in Santa Barbara on Thursday. Sounded pretty intense from what I heard. Glad none of my friends lost their homes and I am sorry to hear about those that did.

Back to work tomorrow. Viva el Micro$oft!

Dev Connections 2008, Click to View More

This morning at work was a fun surprise. I gave a presentation at the all staff meeting and after I was done, I was crowned king of the e-store! Never have been crowned before, was pretty funny overall. There was a red chair/throne in front I was asked to sit in and the crowning took place. I thought at first perhaps we were playing a college drinking game or something.

On top of the crowning, also receive a nice bottle of Patron. Good times ahead!

Who says work cannot be fun?

King of the SBMA E-Store

Woo hoo! Our online store project at work I have been working on over the last six months has now gone live! Our online shopping platform is fully integrated with our point of sale system with products and inventory being updated on a set schedule. Order processing is also done in our existing point of sale software, making the trasition to processing online orders pretty smooth! Overall, I am super happy with the way this project came out!

www.sbmastore.net

Today was a sad day. I went to take off my wireless headset at work and the microphone piece literally just snapped between my fingers. I don’t think I am any stronger than normal. It was weird, it just gave up on life. So there it was, the microphone just dangling by its two wires like a noodle. I will miss my headset, it has served me well. Hopefully I can get a partial replacement without having to replace the entire unit. Sigh.

This is a map that Josie made when I asked how to get to Ohio from Chicago.

Makes perfect sense!

Today was a fun day of driving and flying. I got up early and dropped Dan off at the Cleveland airport at 6:00 or so in the morning and then head to Chicago. Got to Chicago around 12:30 and had to wait an hour to check in (four hour minimum). I started to people watch, that is always fun.

Once checked in, I tried to go to some restaurants for lunch. Everything had a huge line…they have small restaurants like Chili’s Too, Johny Rockets, etc. I finally got in at a Fox sports bar and was happy. Ordered my food and then I had to use the restroom, so I asked the hostess if I could leave my table for a sec, she said sure and would cover my food. I got back and my food was gone and another group sitting at my table! Needless to say, I did not pay for that lunch. Then I could not find anywhere to get lunch at, so I ended up at Mc Donalds, yay. Don’t have that very often and now I remember why!

Four hours later I am in the air and flying home. Flight was nice and easy. Landed in Long Beach around 8 PM and got home to Santa Barbara at 10 PM or so. Feels good to be home, but had a great time and learned quite a bit from the great lands of IL and OH.

Jetting Above the Clouds, Click to View More

Today was a relaxing day in Ohio…nothing big planned. Got up around 10, had the Dan special for breakfast, he really has a great handle on canadian bacon. Steve called and asked if I wanted to go for a ride, of course I did. Dan took me to a gas station for the witness protection transfer and I was whisked away. First stop was an outlet mall that had a train you could ride. Was a beautiful day, about 82 degrees. I bought some Moosehead popcorn there…can’t pass up a deal buy 2, get 1 free.

After the outlet mall, we headed down the road for a while to do some sightseeing. I had no idea there were so many Amish folks in Ohio. Lots of horse and buggies. The country out there is absolutely beautiful….lots of farms, swamps, and natural gas pumps. I love the country roads…not very populated and everybody seems easy going. Peaceful to say the least.

The ride lasted for about a few hours and then was dropped off back at Dan’s for the fifth phase of witness protection transfer. My last night in Ohio…we ended up watching some football and just relaxing. Dan was quite the chef today and made his special Manhattan clam chowder with shrimp…was tasty! Also got caught up on laundry and packed up for tomorrow.

Tomorrow I am dropping Dan off at the airport in Cleveland around 6 AM and then I drive to Chicago for my flight back to California that leaves at 5:30 PM….be home by 8 PM. Going to definitely be an adjustement back after spending a few days here in Ohio.

I really cannot thank Dan, Steve, Randy, Ken, Mike, Justus and the rest of the Acuity-VCT team enough for all of their hospitality during this trip. Is very nice to know there are still great people out there in the world and I think I have found some of the best out in Ohio.

See you all back in California real soon!

The Outlet Mall, Click to View More