If you are subscribed to SQL Server “GuruGoddessHera” Kimberly Tripp, then you have been following her incredible around the world travel schedule. Kimberly has been doing immense training and impacting SQL Server management worldwide. She is an amazing inspiration in her teachings to many people around the world and to those of us who also like to try to help people learn. What this woman could use is a nice long underwater vacation! I hope she gets one soon. I look forward to catching up with her at DevConnections next month, but I think I’ll just invite her to go relax in a hot spring somewhere.

Posted from BLInk!

Carl Franklin videotaped pieces of code camp and interviewed people about attending. It’s fun to watch and you can see that this event that Thom Robbins’ invented is going to be a model to be adopted around the contry. Yeah Thom. Yeah everyone who helped out with it.

Sounds like a song doesn’t it? But it’s a new blog by Valerie Winberg of Minnesotta. Val is a C# programmer with a VB background. Thanks Avonelle for pointing her out!!

So I wonder if this could inspire a new tune from Band on the Runtime.

Posted from BLInk!

Rich & I visited a good friend in the hospital yesterday who is a .NET programmer. She was waiting for her next pain meds and was feeling pretty crappy when we got there, but she’s a total trooper. I brought a handful of my favorite novels and a newly minted tech book. Even in her pain, her face completely lit up when I showed her “Best Kept Secrets in .NET” by Deborah Kurata. I mean, she had been very happy with the chocolate croissant I brought, but the book definitely took the cake for her!

by way of The Daily Grind

Do you read tech blogs? We’re looking for you to tell us which are the best of the best. Right now, it’s your chance to nominate your favorite independent tech blogs.

Ten finalists, one winner, $500 worth of coffee, a whole bunch of promotion.
Ten finalists will be announced on November 1 and will receive a "2004 Best Tech Blog Finalist" logo and six months of promotion across TechWeb Network sites. Voting begins on November 1 and on November 15 the winner will be announced. The winner receives a special "2004 Best Tech Blog" logo and (to keep those blogging juices flowing late into the night) a $500 coffee card from Starbucks.

uh oh, this picture looks like it spells trouble… 🙂 Click on the picture to read about the latest “The .NET Show” on Connected Systems. For those of you who have not had the privelege…this is Doug Purdy (left) and Don Box  (right). And no it’s not trouble, I’m kidding. Doug and Don have a very unique way (it’s a good one … if you are not grokking my tongue in cheek, here) of delivering information on this topic that will drive the future (and for many of us, the present) of how we write software while delivering their message …well, on any topic, actually. If you need a map to figure out that very convoluded sentence…just leave a comment. Next time I’ll try to write it with Indigo.

Kate’s speaking at TechEd South Africa which is a great stroke of luck for attendees.

But lucky Kate, too! Check *this* out!

I love the whole Imagine Cup competition and have always been excited about it in the past. The 2005 registration has just gone live. I already emailed the head of the software engineering department at the most technical of our local schools, Champlain College, to encourage a team to enter although there are no .NET courses in the undergrad level (yet…).

aha – now the mystery of the new MVP gift is solved. Darn – anyone want to trade for a very nice Swiss Army backpack? 🙂

Congrats Clemens – they created a whole new MVP category … Solutions Architect.