mr. happyfunboy goes to atlanta

that's right kiddos...your friendly neighborhood happyfunboy made the 4 hour jaunt to atlanta on tuesday.

the reason?

none other than harry "the king" brelsford and his smb nation army were in town, putting on a "birds of a feather" workshop that afternoon.

this workshop followed the hands-on study labs for the 70-282 exam they had been running the previous day or so.

now...regular visitors to the funcave might remember some of the writeups i did concerning the smb nation 2005 conference that harry's gang threw in redmond this past september. in case you missed them, just start here and work backwards using the archive links.

as a refresher, the smb nation conference was...without a doubt...the best technical conference i have ever been to in my career.

well, the workshop was very similar, albeit on a much smaller scale.

there was a good bit of content i was interested in, but as a side benefit it was also a chance to continue to connect with peers, vendors, and the smb nation crew.

so i thought i'd offer the following list as a rundown of the day's events...

happyfunboy's super amazing best of atlanta with smb nation, january 2006

• getting to atlanta without hitting any major slowdown or traffic
• finding the location on the first try
• arriving so early that i got to help nancy "head asskicker" williams set up for the event, and generally knucklehead around a bit with her
• "saving the day" by retrieving the projector harry inadvertantly left at his hotel in mid-town atlanta
• meeting karl palachuk in-person, and talking shop with him
• chatting with rosanna, the new 70-282 proctor
  
• being introduced by harry and getting to tell the attendees about sbs show to kick off the workshop
• seeing four or five members of the alabama smb user group in attendance.
• meeting frank "the youngster" mccallister, an sbs-mvp and new member of asmbug, in-person.
• hearing, over and over, someone tell me they are an avid listener of sbs show
• finding out that nancy was on puerto rico's 1998 world cup women's soccer team
• being interviewed on-camera by harry after the workshop
  
• pitching in to help break down and pack everything up
  
• heading down the street for a bit of post-workshop r&r with harry, nancy, karl, rosanna, nancy's cousin, and the hp rep.
  

• seeing the 360 degree view of atlanta by night from the sun dial, atop the westin.
• swapping some shop talk and funny stories
• getting a ton of face time with harry, which not even his own cpa can get with him!
  

most of all, the day was a good reminder of the philosophy that makes the conference in redmond so awesome:

always have fun, even while you're getting some serious business done.