I remember the days when I had plenty of time to blog once or twice a day from the PASS Summit. Well, those days are over apparently, for two reasons. First, my time is more limited these days than before. Second, I never seem to be near a power supply and I could really use an 18-hour battery.
Today is Wednesday, we are half way through the week, and what a week. Every year that I come to this Summit it becomes more valuable to me professionally. The connections I make here allow for me to feel like a valued member of the community. I get to spend time with the SQL CAT team, members of the SQL development team, SQL product managers, vendors that offer specialized SQL products, and continue to build my network.
How valuable is all of that? I can sum it all up by saying this to any manager:
“You don’t just get me, you get my network.”
Yesterday I attended a great session on understanding wait types presented by Bob Ward. Today I will be in a session on logging and recovery by Paul Randal. Tomorrow will be something equally incredible and valuable. But on top of the sessions this year I am also gaining some valuable experience through being a member of the Board of Directors.
I would also say that it is quite strange to be here and have people seek me out to say hello. I was not expecting to have so many people come here with the idea in mind that they want to meet me, just as I come here saying I want to meet someone else. I have had very little sleep which is partly due to the fact that this conference gives me so much energy. I usually sleep on the red-eye flight home as I decompress after this week but while here my mind is racing with all kinds of new ideas. This year I have decided to walk around with a pen and paper to write down my thoughts as opposed to using my laptop.
That’s all for now, I need to pack up and move along.
