I was disappointed to see the mention in the Connector today that there would be no SQLRally 2013 in the US. Reading the minutes from the May 2012 Board meeting (and you should read it to do your own interpretation) it feels like the decision was made largely on two points – Rally was not […]
Read more "No More SQLRally In the US"It’s been interesting to watch the characters evolve on NCIS over the years, something that can only happen with time (and the luxury of surviving on the air long enough to get the time!). Whether you watch it or not, you might find value (and humor) in the “rules” that Gibbs lives by. Rule #9 […]
Read more "The Rules of Gibbs"One of the things I’ve been doing lately is pruning (again) the number of newsletter type emails I get. Some I’ve moved over to my feed reader, some I’ve just had to shut off for now. Often they are useful and interesting (and I still get some), I just don’t have the time and energy […]
Read more "Unsubscribing"I’m fond of replying with “done” when a task is complete, no need for anything more elaborate. I’ve been experimenting with a status board using 3×5 cards and push pins just to see how I like it compared to sticky notes, one of the columns is for “done” items. Somehow that just didn’t seem satisfying, […]
Read more "The Done Stamp"This idea came up during a critique of a presentation. I may have re-invented (or re-labeled) something that is already out there, but wanted to throw this out as a different way to look at presentations. Presentations are stories, performances, and they need to flow, but seeing that flow isn’t easy when you’re the presenter, […]
Read more "Building a Presentation Map"There’s a lot to be said for the philosophy of Never Eat Alone, using meals as a great time to meet new people or reconnect with people you already now. I try to use that approach at events, probably because it’s easier to do when there are hundreds of people around who want to (or […]
Read more "It’s OK To Eat Alone"I watched the documentary on Nova about the IBM project to build Watson, a computer that could play Jeopardy. The technical bits are interesting, maybe even staggering in some ways, especially when you consider it’s all to do what a single human can do! It ran without being connected to the internet during the game, […]
Read more "Watson Plays Jeopardy"I’m part of the team putting together SQLSaturday #151 in Orlando this year, and one of the things Kendal Van Dyke asked if I could work on was marketing ideas. How do we reach more of those interested in SQL Server in or near Orlando? The task is to come up with ideas, then the […]
Read more "Marketing Ideas for Chapters & SQLSaturday"I received an email from LinkedIn suggesting that I might find these groups useful: I’m sure those map back to someone in my network, but not sure at all how they would determine that these would fit me. BI gone wrong? Or do they know something I don’t?
Read more "LinkedIn Group Recommendations-Not Quite Useful"I was chatting with a friend recently and he said he could never blog the way I do. Which way is that? His take was I just dump my thoughts, and that doing so required some amount of courage to put unpolished thoughts out for reading by others. I haven’t ever thought of the way […]
Read more "The Brain Dump Blog"
SQLAndy 