Microsoft Ignite – Day 2 (Wednesday)

Wednesday

So I was going to start this day off with the Diversity breakfast…but due to getting in so late, unfortunately sleep won out so I could get an extra hour. Was told it was great, bit disappointed I missed it! πŸ™

Got up, had my morning cup of tea (no tea = no me…*need* tea! And I will totally remember my travel cup tomorrow!) and then headed across. First session – the best session so far, on cleaning up legacy stuff and moving on so you don’t have to worry about it. Seriously, brilliant. Simone and Ben did a fabulous job. The download pack they produced should come in real handy!

Spent the next session in the speaker lounger, talking with a few other speakers regarding my talk and their talks, getting a few new insights on things we’re doing at work…and some good ideas to take back! Also had an amazing talk with two lovely ladies –Β Michelle Sandford and Jessica Payne. Rare to get a group of women speakers together to have a chat about the industry and how we think it’s going. Was a very interesting chat!

Attended a couple of sessions – Orin Thomas’s “30 Bad Habits” was awesome. I had listened to a fair chunk of this talk already, off Channel 9, when he presented in NZ…but he presented it entirely different. He’s a very dynamic and agile speaker. Tad jealous…

Wanted to stick my head into Regan’s session but HOLY BEJBUS! The room was PACKED! They ended up needing to boost the aircon, it was so hot from all the bodies. Know a few people who went, so will be sure to pick their brains…and watch the recording once it’s up on Channel 9!

Tried to attend a DSC talk as well, hoping there’d be a bit more focus on how to use it to look after your servers, but it was fairly heavily Developer focused, which was a bit of a shame – wasn’t really what I expected from the talk at all. Heading out, bumped into a few people who were discussing DSC and how to look at implementing it for servers, so not a total waste! ^_^

Spent some time again in the speaker lounge, doing some final work on my presentations and speaking with a few other Microsoft people. It was at this point I should note that I must’ve been distracted…I wish I could say who distracted me, so I could blame them, but I truly don’t know. I was doing work on my presentations on my tablet and then next minute I was off walking to speak to a few other people and attend a few other sessions and I must’ve left it behind…something I didn’t notice until midway through Jessica Payne‘s session on Windows Event Log Forwarding – seriously, sorry Jess for bailing on you, it was no indication of you as a speaker, and every indication of me being a mindless idiot!

Had a minor breakdown, spoke to a few people in security and from the event who were *AMAZING* in helping me out. Few phone calls later and it was discovered a tablet had been handed in to the office…a small, grey ASUS tablet. Mine.

Seriously – whoever you are who so honestly and selflessly handed in my tablet – THANK YOU. This isn’t a work device, this didn’t come from my organisation, this is my own personal machine and I paid for it myself. To lose it (and all my data…and credentials!) would have been absolutely devastating, especially just before I was supposed to speak! I was so grateful it had been handed in and I was able to get it back – no kidding, I hugged it all the way back to my hotel room.

For those who don’t know (or are new to this blog) – I’m very open about a lot of things, especially mental health. I suffer from anxiety, and losing my tablet is big enough to send me into a massive tail spin. I have to thank the wonderful people who look after the event for being patient and kind and understanding with me regarding this – there was no judgement about me bawling my eyes out because I’d lost a device, they took it in their stride. Huge HUGE thanks to them.

After discovering I hadn’t lost my device, I was able to spend a few minutes calming the hell down (this takes a bit of effort…), was able to gather myself together, dump my stuff, throw on a pair of heels (because it always makes me feel better!) and head to the Veeam party. Glad I did, because catching up with all the people there was probably the best medicine I could’ve been prescribed! Was a really lovely chill night – only a few drinks, but enough to mellow me out πŸ™‚

Early night, back to the hotel for around 11pm (hey, that’s early for these kind of events people!) and then time to type a few notes from the day to be able to flesh out a good blog post before spending some time chilling to some DECENT music (none of this dancey pop nonsense :P) and having a cup of tea before bed.

Tomorrow another day will dawn…and it’ll be time to present! Wish me luck!

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