Another year as an MVP

I’ve been a Microsoft MVP for over ten years now. And now I’m going to be an MVP for another year. Which is lovely.

Open Day and Saying Cheese

To be honest the day didn’t get off to the best of starts. I was crammed into a photo booth in Cottingham Post Office taking a picture of myself for a Russian Visa. Turns out that photo booths, like lots of other things in my life, weren’t really designed for someone of my stature. So I was trying desperately to get all of my head into the right part of the picture, repeatedly re-taking the picture and failing to get all of my apparently enormous face into the frame.

After numerous retries the system gave up on me and printed the tenth or so attempt. Fortunately it looks OK, and so my passport, along with lots of accompanying documentation, is now on the way to London and visafication.

The reason I’m after a visa is that I’m helping with the judging of the Imagine Cup World Finals the week after next. They’ve got some amazing judges, including the chap who invented Tetris,  and they’ve got Matt Smith, of Dr. Who fame, hosting the awards presentation.

I’m really looking forward to going along and taking part. Visa permitting. With a bit of luck the visa should be sorted on Monday and I can start choosing which gadgets to take…

Once I’d posted my visa application I shot straight into the university for an Open Day.

I did two talks, this is the first audience.

This is outside the library, we had our American Football Team, along with the rowers to show the kinds of things we get up to. 

This is the second sitting for my Open Day talk. Another great audience.

During the talks I mentioned the “Yellow Book” that we use to teach C#. You can download a PDF of the book from here. There are also some other free documents there too. All in all a great day, hope that everyone who made the trip found it worth their while.

Achievement Unlocked: Resits Written

After a couple of days of solid work I’ve managed to write all my resit coursework and exams. So, if you are unlucky enough to have to come back for a resit later this summer, at least you’ll have something to do now.

Paying for Things can be Cool

One thing abut the internets that I really don’t like is the culture of “everything is free”. There is an expectation that if you want something, be it web hosting, email or a way of sharing with your friends a picture what you had for dinner then it seems like you can you can get it all for nothing.

There are a few things about this that I don’t like. Firstly, folks need to realise that lots of services are built on the back of this free stuff that may ultimately come back to haunt you. Secondly, companies that acquire market share by giving stuff away may not be around for the long haul. Finally, and this is the kicker for me, if something goes wrong you are completely stuck, as nobody has a financial motivation to make you happy.

I pay a small sum each month to Squarespace who in return host this wonderful blog. On Sunday I had what I thought was a problem, so I emailed support. They responded within the hour and as a result I found that it was actually something I was doing, not their fault. They’ve just sent me a feedback form I can use to rate the quality of their service. Great stuff. And almost certainly not what would have happened if their service was free.

Facebook Picture Fun and Games

While I was away last week I was stupid enough to try and log in to Facebook from my phone to respond to a message. Facebook saw that I had left Hull for a little while and went into a high security mode, locking my account. Thanks for that.

To recover things I had to go through and identify pictures of folks that I know, which is always a problem for me as I’ve got a terrible memory for faces. Not that it would have made much difference in the picture above.

Exam Boards and Jet Lag

There is nothing quite like being in an exam board with jet lag. Take it from me.

Heading Home

Today we had to head home, which meant experiencing “The Miracle of Flight”. For me this means spending a few hours crammed behind a bloke who insisted on reclining his seat, even though I had mentioned to him hat my legs don’t have a joint in them that would make this possible. As we got on the plane one of the more alert stewardesses made the observation that “This plane wasn’t built for someone as tall as you”. Indeed. But then complaining about the seating arrangements when you are flying back from somewhere as nice as New Orleans seems a bit churlish.

A local chap reckons that the best times to visit the city are spring and autumn, when the heat is a bit less intense. That may be true. But I’d be happy to go back there next week if I got the chance. Great place.

My First Tomato Festival

I don’t know much about tomatoes. Mostly red, different sizes, used in bolognaise and on pizza, some discussion over whether or not they are a fruit. Oh, and in New Orleans they have a festival for them. It was a bit warm, but you could always cool down with a Bloody Mary drink. We took a wander through the French Market and I took a whole bunch of photographs.

Including this one. We have to head home tomorrow, which is rather sad as I’m just about getting the hang of “The Big Easy”.

Oyster Festival

I’ve never been to an oyster festival before. And I’ve never had oysters from the BBQ before. Both were great.

Hull Waterfront

We had a sort of plan to go to the seaside today. Then we figured that lots of other folks would have that plan too. And so we went for a walk around the waterfont at Hull. We went past the deep and round the old town, had a fantastic Beef and Stilton sandwich at McCoy’s and then staggered home to play some silly Table Tennis in the garden.

Shopping in Leeds

Went to Leeds today and bought some trousers. And took this photo of one of the arcades.

Finalists BBQ

We had our Finalists BBQ today. This is pretty much the last free food that students get out of us (except perhaps for the sandwiches at the Degree Ceremony reception in July). Plenty of folks turned up to avail themselves of the various forms of cooked meat (which were all delicious) and talk about old times.

There are some more pictures on Flickr, you can find them here.

Thanks to Warren for paying for it all.

Thwaite Gardens Open Day

We’ve been to Thwaite Gardens Open Day a few years in a row. We had the best weather a couple of years ago, last year was a bit iffy and we weren’t too hopeful about this year. But in the end it was nice and bright, and the sun even made a guest appearance.  The Friends of Thwaite Gardens spend all year making the place look lovely and then we come along, take photographs and have tea and scones.

Thwaite Student Hall. If you live here you get all this loveliness thrown in.

You wouldn’t believe this was right in the middle of suburbia.

Some plant or other (gardening was never my strong point).

We bought some plants for our garden, and we’ll be back next year. If you live in the area you really should go along.

Christian Aid Humber Bridge Cross

We did the annual Humber Brides cross for Christian Aid today. We’ve been doing this since we had to push the kids around in little chairs, which was quite time ago. The weather was mostly kind to us, apart from the horizontal rain and the cold winds, but we did manage to get there and back, which was nice.

Bank Holiday in Good Weather Shock

A British Bank Holiday and great weather. Shurely shome mishtake?

But no. We went out to Dalby Forest, which was the busiest I’ve ever seen it. Mind you, the place being the size it is, there was plenty of room to spread out and have our picnic.

I even found a log with a built in cup holder.

Blossom

We seem to be having some slightly nicer weather at the moment. So much so that the blossom has arrived. Which is nice.

Last Applicant Day for 2012-2013

These are the people who laughed at the “Polar Bear” joke. Thanks for that.

Today we had our last open day of this academic year. Pretty busy too. Thanks to all of you for coming along, particularly the intrepid bunch that came all the way from the Isle of White. Great fun was had. I love an excuse to get out some gadgets and show them off….

Spring is starting to spring

After a lot of trying, and frosts all over the place at the wrong time, we are finally starting to see signs of spring. The daffodils have actually been flowering.

Which is rather nice.

Ahead of the Game

I went up town today to buy a copy of Lego City Undercover, which I had heard was due out on Friday. It is due out on Friday. Next Friday.

Oh well.

Profound Question

If you found something that you’d lost, but you had already mentally prepared yourself for buying a replacement, can you now spend that amount of money on some other gadget without any guilt problems?