That is the title of Richard and my Monday night keynote at the Software Developers Confrence in the Netherlands. Well I think it is now: “Estaban, splain dis Jukon to me!“ where we talk all about SQL Server 2005 in bad Spanish accents. To tell you the truth we have no idea what we are going to talk about, we do know that it will  be fun, contain beer and technical content. Confrences in the Netherlands rock.

Off to the Red Lights...

At TechED 2005 US in Orlando, you will not want to miss the GrokTalks. Trust me. They break the mold and do not follow the MS party line. Stay tuned...

24 states have laws barring interstate shipments of wine. This is done to protect state industry. It is foolish. This means if I travel to Napa and visit a vinyard that is small they can't ship me wine unless they are “doing business in New York State”. Might as well move back to the Soviet Union.

Anyway, today the Supreme Court agreed with me and overturned a NY and Michigan law.

Today at 2 p.m. Nepal time, Ed Viesturs, reached the summit of Annapurna. He has failed in the past, but by getting here he has become the first American to climb all 14 of the world's 8,000-meter peaks (and all without oxygen, having been there I know how hard that is!). In a call from the summit, Ed said that it's "one of the happiest days of my life, one of the hardest days of my life."

Congratulations Ed!

We are losing another great RD to the mother ship. The great and wonderful Malek (This doesn’t suck) Kemmou will be starting a new job in less than two weeks: he will be the Technology Architect – Application Platform for Microsoft Middle East and Africa based in Istanbul, Turkey. The Middle East and North Africa region is gaining a very talented architect with a background not only in MS but competitive technologies, so he will be able to provide the best solutions in an area desperate for some technological horsepower. Malek brings his tremendous experience to the role and will help revitalize a region of the world where technology is just starting to make an impact.

On Sunday afternoon, Goksin, Malek and I are going have an orange badge to blue ceremony and throw our orange badges into the Bosphorus as a sign of unity with our buddy. (I am not sure how we are going to explain how we need replacement badges to our local office, but that is a problem for Monday.)

Good luck my friend!

The 2005 North Africa Developers Conference in Algiers, Algeria is over. Boy was it a smashing success. Over 2,200 developers attended and more had to be turned away due to space restrictions. I pushed hard for Microsoft to go into Algiers to make a statement, so I am glad it worked.

I had standing room only in all of my 4 sessions. I met several students, professionals and even lots of open source folks who wanted to see what Microsoft was all about.

While my French has improved since the first NDC, my sessions were still interpreted and all went well. I was the ONLY speaker from the United States, I hope I made a good impression (early feedback says so and I did have standing room only in my talks!)

After the conference we went to the roof of the convention center overlooking Algiers and the beautiful Mediterranean for a reception with government officials and the attendees. I used my limited French to talk with the mayor of Algiers about the tall building in New York and my running and biking in Central Park.

There were several RD there including the very reclusive Frecnh RDs, but some tequila got Pierre (aka ALL CAPS) Couzy to open up some more. We had a blast. All the RDs there were:

Me :)

Clemens

Malek

Goksin

Sylvain Duford

Pierre Couzy (ALL CAPS)

Yann Faure

Eric Groise

Off to Istanbul next.

Back from India, boy was it hot. Sanjay (RD Bombay) and I had a blast. Off to speak at the North Africa Developers Conference in Algeria this weekend. Seven RDs (including the ones who speak French ) will be there in full force. I plan on making Clemens see the light while I am there. I am doing these 4 sessions:

Writing Secure Code for ASP .NET

Data Controls and Advanced Cache Techniques with ASP .NET

Ranking and Windowing Functions in SQL Server 2005

Using XQuery to Query and Manipulate Data in SQL Server 2005

And: The New York Mets and the New York Yankees have the exact same record. I am enjoying it while it lasts. It seems that the Mets are 1-5 when I am in the country and 3-0 when I am not.