Not Writing Code

I’ve hardly touched a keyboard or mouse for the last few days and I must admit that I quite like this. I have had to use the computer to get pictures off the camera though…

The weather is being very nice to us.

Tools and Trains

Went down to Bewley today and took a look at their town museum that promises “A surprise around every corner”. I wouldn’t quite go that far, but there were some nice photo-ops.

A bit like my garage

Then we went on to the Severn Valley Railway.

Not steam, but nice all the same.

Ho For Holidays

And so to the holidays. Packing up the cameras and the computers so we can go and live for a week without broadband.

Maybe we could be in for some good weather, which would make a nice change.

Day Trip

Went out for the day today. Any idea where?

.. we had good weather though..

Nice place

Scarborough Sea Battles

We went off today for a day trip to Scarborough. They say that “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” and I’m starting from a fairly dull base, and so we went off for some fun and games. Took the big camera.

Scarborough Seaside

Posh Hotel

Artistic Nets

Sea Battle

They have this thing where they re-enact naval battles in a boating lake. No, really. Number one daughter didn’t believe me either, until I took her along. Great fun.

If you look carefully you can see that there is actually a man in the ship..

Pyramids

I’ve been told that however much you prepare for the experience, seeing the pyramids for the first time will blow you away. And it does.

The first glimpse

They really are impressive. Close up they are beyond huge, and when you reflect who made them, and how, you just get even more impressed.

Not small

The key is 52 degrees apparently. Anything else falls down.

Antiquities Police

Obligatory tourist shot

Count the Chicks

We went down to Slimbridge today. We like going there. If you are going to bird watch I reckon it is best to go to a place where they keep loads of birds.

Apparently these chicks are all part of a record breaking brood. But how many can you find in the picture?

Whitby at Easter

The weather forecast wasn’t wonderful. But that hasn’t stopped us from going to Whitby before, and it wouldn’t this time. And the Big Camera went too.

Beach Huts

The Harbour

We did get rained on. But we did manage to get into “The Magpie” for lunch. This is quite famous for serving really good fish and chips. And it was really good.

Round Thing with No Purpose I can Understand

Advance Jetlag

I seemed to have jetlag in advance today. From trying to scan the passport in the wrong part of the check-in machine, to having a suitcase 3 pounds over weight, to being invisible to all flight attendants on the plane (and the person sat in front, who insisted on trying to tip her seat back even though this is not physically possible if I am sat behind you), to losing my headphones the whole day has not been much fun. Good thing that, thanks to the flight, I seem to have lost 8 hours of it somewhere.

Leaving Seattle

Our flight left early afternoon, which meant there was time for one final Seattle breakfast. It was as if the city was putting on its best show ever in an attempt to get us to stick around. The weather was the best I’ve ever seen in the place, which exposed some superb views.

Market sign

Ferry and mountains

Ferry arriving (as seen in “Grey’s Anatomy”)

To be honest, it won’t take much to persuade me to come back. Then it was off to the airport.

Plane spotting at the airport.

It has been a great summit, here’s to next time…

Seattle Air Museum

Today was our day off. We planned to go to the Seattle Museum of Flight. Being an economical traveller I was going by bus. I had written careful notes describing which bus to take and where to get off. Being an idiot, I of course left these in the hotel room, but remembered enough to get us onto route 174 from tunnel C.

Seattle has this wonderful underground level, in fact the city is built up on previous implementations. You catch the bus in something that looks just like a subway station, except that there are busses instead of trains.  The bus took us through some of the industrial heartland of Seattle, which is pretty heavy engineering, and finally deposited us outside the museum.

We were a bit worried about finding the right stop, but they had parked a handy marker for us.

The museum is amazing, which loads of planes, many of them hanging from their enormous exhibit halls.

We had really come to see Concorde though. We have a familial link with the plane, knowing the one based in Bristol quite well. We thought we’d check out the one in Seattle as well.

Truth is, the one in Bristol is much more of an experience. At Seattle the plane looks rather forlorn, tucked away in one corner of a collection. In Bristol there is much more room to move around the plane and you actually get to sit in the seats as you make your way around it. Here in the souvenir hunter conscious Seattle everything, including seats inside the plane, are hidden under layers of plastic.

Concorde Flight Deck

After a wait for the returning bus we got back to Seattle just in time to go up the Columbia tower. This is the tallest building in downtown area and has an observation deck which gives some of the best views of the city.

You can see the Space Needle in the middle of the picture.

If you ever go to Seattle you should go up this tower. Oh yes. Cheaper than the Space Needle (although that is a great experience) and you can see a lot further.

Then it was out for tea (chicken and chocolate anyone?) and then back to the hotel.

Last day at the MVP Summit

Steve B makes a point.

Say what you like about Steve Balmer (and lots of people do) the guy can work an audience. I’ve seen him speak a few times and he’s not failed to deliver yet. His talk (and the question and answer session at the end) was one of the highlights of the keynotes that we had today. Although the session about Windows 7 from Mike Nash was also very good. I think I’m allowed to say that Windows 7 is looking very promising. For me the only thing bad about it is that you can’t buy it in the shops yet.

Once the keynotes were over that was just about the end of formal proceedings for the summit. It was great to see everyone again, and put some faces to names that I’ve only ever seen on mailing lists in the past. We went out for a wander around Seattle.

In the Seattle Art Gallery they have these cars hanging from the ceiling with lights coming out of them. Not sure why, but it sure looks nice.

Pioneer Square

More Meetings and Science Fiction Frenzy

Today was the second and final time at the Microsoft campus.  More presentations and more good stuff. I took a trip over the the legendary Microsoft Company store which was wonderful. Halo Wars on day of release at 25 dollars? I should think so. Of course I had resolved not to spend much money. Of course I failed.

In the evening it was time for the summit party, which was held at the “Experience Music Project” at the base of the Space Needle. They had Rock Band, karaoke with a live backing group and huge amounts of food and drink.

It was a bit like our Christmas Bash, only slightly bigger.

The venue is also host to a great science fiction museum, with books, props, sets and robots to look at. Great stuff.

This guy was working the lights on the video wall behind the stage. What a cool job.

MVP Summit Opens

Toby Richards gets us all fired up.

The MVP summits happen every year or so. Microsoft invites all of the 4,000 or “Most Valuable Professionals” they have recognised for efforts in their field to come to their headquarters and meet with the teams that actually make the products.

It still amazes me that Microsoft organise things like this. It must cost them a fortune, and in these cash-strapped times they might be looking at other things to spend their money on. Quite often, when things get tough the on of the first things to go is events like this, where the benefits are very hard to put directly onto the bottom line.

Each MVP is awarded in a particular specialism. I began in the area of Mobile Devices (search for “Smartphone Cheese”) to find out how I got started. More recently I’ve done work with XNA and the .NET Micro Framework, but I’m still very interested in device development, and so that is what I was here to find out more about.

The summit began with some welcome presentations, starting with Toby Richards who manages the MVP programme. It was rather nice to have someone stand at the front and tell us all how important we are (although I always feel a bit guilty at this point as I’m never quite sure what it is I have done to merit the attention). Then we had a talk from another Microsoft bigwig, as Rich Kaplan told us lots of interesting things about the future that a Non Disclosure Agreement that I’ve signed prevents me from writing much about. Suffice it to say that things are going to be interesting.

Then it was outside for food and mingling. I’m not a great mingler. I tend to stand there like a lampost with a drink, whilst everyone mills around me. But I did meet up with a few people that I hadn’t seen for a while, and I even remembered some names, which is nice.

Then it was back to the hotel and a meal in the lounge right at the top. This has some amazing views. I’ll take the camera next time.

The summit starts proper tomorrow, with meetings with the product teams. Can’t wait.

And So to Seattle

The MVP Summit is next week in Seattle, and lucky old me is going, which is nice. Set off today from Humberside, my favourite airport.

We had a very smooth journey, and I took a few quick pictures on the way.

Obligatory Taxi Shot

Night Traffic. (I just wish the hotel windows were a bit cleaner)

Pictures from Portugal

I’ve noticed that one way to get really good photographs is to go to nice places and take pictures of them. I’ve lost count of the number of lovely shots I’ve seen in photo books with captions like “The Rice Fields on the mountains of Jokarta look lovely just after dawn”. In this respect, Portugal is a definite win. It has this fantastic light.

Cranes on the skyline

The way into the hotel. Pity the fountains were turned off, but you can’t have everything.

The venue this year was the Instituto Superior Tecnico at Taguspark, right opposite the Microsoft Portugal offices.  I like doing sessions in Portugal. I always get a great audience. The session was all about the .NET Micro Framework, and how you can take over the world using it.

I said I’d put a picture of you all up after the session. Here you all are.

Playing with the toys afterwards…

Now, that’s some kind of font…

Outside the building.

I got back last night and staggered into bed. I’d been away just about 24 hours or so and spent 8 of those in the air. But it was all great fun. Thanks to Microsoft Portugal for setting it up.

I’ll be putting the sample code and the presentation up on my blog tonight.

DevDays 09 in Portugal

I’m off to Portugal next week. I’m doing a session at DevDays 09 about the .NET Micro Framework. If you happen to be in Lisbon next week it would be great to see you.

Never Trust a Plane that still has a Propeller

I was supposed to fly out to Copenhagen to give a session tomorrow as part of the Windows Embedded European tour. I had all my slides with the snazzy tour template, and a bag packed with hardware to show off.

Instead I went to an airport, sat in a plane for forty minutes, had a drink of orange juice, got out of the plane, queued for an hour, found out there was no way I could get to Copenhagen in time and went home.

We had all watched the plane land, and then were told that "For safety reasons" it was not able to take off again. I reckon the people that we saw arrive in it had a lucky escape.

Such is life I suppose. I tried to be relaxed about it. The only time I got a bit cross was when I was at the desk after an hour wait and the lady there was trying to sort out my travel plans. Having determined that there were no seats on any flights out today, and that a flight tomorrow would have me arrive far too late for my session, I said that in that case there was no point in me going. "So" she said, "You are choosing not to take up our offer of an alternative flight?". I made the point that it was not a matter of choice, if I couldn't get there today there was no reason to travel. "OK." she replied "I'll put on the file that you have decided not to take up our offer". I was too tired to put up much of a fight, and anyway a prominent notice reminded me that anyone who got too shirty would have the full might of KLM to deal with. Assuming they could actually get here of course, what with their transportation technology being so ropey.

I'm very sorry that I didn't make it out to Denmark. I was looking forward to meeting up with the students and seeing some cool Lego tech. Perhaps another time.

Visual Basic in the City of Dreams

So, what do you do when you are in the city of dreams, when the day dawns full of sunshine, wonder and promise? You stay in your hotel room and write Visual Basic courseware. That's what.

Mind you, after the excitement of yesterday I could probably do with something a little more sedate. And I did nip out to City Walk for a burger. And of course I took the camera.

I call this one "Water Pipe and PDC bus"

Let's Go Skydiving

I'm not very good on fairground rides. And I hate heights. So why not jump out of a plane at 12,500 feet?

I blame Iain. He mentioned that, seeing as we were out in LA a day early, and he knew of this ace skydiving place down the road, why not drive down there and maybe do a jump?

Iain is a proper skydiver, with his own parachute and everything. I would be travelling with a partner who would do all the important bits and make sure that nobody died. Having signed one of the scariest waivers I have ever seen in my life, forked out a goodly sum of cash (including the video package where they give you your own cameraman up there to film the whole thing) we set off.

I felt really sorry for my instructor. There were three of us doing tandem jumps. Two charming, beautiful and petite young ladies. And me. If he did draw the short straw, he took it with good grace, and was excellent. How you can make a career out of strapping yourself to total strangers and leaping out of planes with them is a mystery to me, but by gum, he was good.

 

Forced jollity at ten thousand feet

After this it is downhill all the way

The instructor even let me drive for a while.

Bank on terra firma.

I can't describe what it was like. How it feels to be falling at 120 miles an hour is a difficult thing to put into words. I can say only it was like nothing else. And if you get the chance you should do it. I've got a video of the whole thing, nicely set to Frank Sinatra. I'll put it up once I've transcoded it.

Thanks and kudos to instructor Adi Blair, videographer Herbie Loureiro and everyone at the Perris Valley Skydiving School who made the most frightening thing I've ever done in my life so much fun.