Thursday, June 26, 2008

Networkers at Cisco Live! Day 3

Well yesterday was a long day.  Had the normal training and speakers during the day and did some exploring of the trade show floor.  There are some neat applications that leverage Cisco's IP Telephony equipment in health care environments.

After class Emily and I went to a Brazilian steak house for dinner.  It was ok, but not worth the bill at all.  Oh well, live and learn.  Later in the evening was the Cisco customer appreciation at Universal Studios.  I was really looking forward to this because I figured with that big of a venue it would not be as crowded as normal.  Unfortunately Cisco only reserved a small subset of the park so it was still crowded and many of the fun rides were not available.  It was still fun, but a let down.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Networkers at Cisco Live! Day 2

Yesterday was the official first day of the conference.  As such Cisco CEO John Chambers gave his annual keynote.  He's a very good speaker and as usual had lots of insights as to where technology is headed.  His Chief Demonstration Officer (CDO) always makes an appearance as well with a demo of some new product or technology.  Unfortunately this year's was rather low key compared to past demos.

After my classes were over, Emily and I decided to have a lower key night and went to the Florida Mall which is a rather large mall nearby.  We went to Bucca di Beppo for dinner and then walked around the mall.

Tonight is the big customer appreciation event at Universal so I'll probably need a nap this afternoon between class and the party. :-)

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Networkers at Cisco Live! Day 1

Ok so I need to recap yesterday.  Yesterday for me was an all day Techtorial on Enterprise deployment of IP Telephony.  It was a fairly good overview, but not as in depth as I had hoped for.

The really good news was that Disney was able to replace our tickets based on the ticket numbers provided by the Orlando Visitors Bureau that I had ordered the tickets from online.   As such Emily and I spent most of the evening at the Magic Kingdom.  We had a lot of fun and going at night meant the lines were fairly short for the most part.  I can now finally say that I've been to Disney. :-)

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Networkers at Cisco Live! Day 0

Today started in Bloomington, IL getting up at 04:00 CDT to get to the airport for a 06:00 CDT flight to Atlanta and then on to Orlando.  Unfortunately we started off with a whimper as I discovered that I had left the folder with the Disney tickets at home.  We're still debating on how to rectify that either with new tickets or doing something different.  The flights were uneventful and Emily made it through even though she's not big on flying.  Once in Orlando we checked in to our hotel and she napped while I crammed for my Cisco Exam.

Unfortunately my studying was for naught as I had not realized that I was studying for an older version of the exam.  I didn't do too poorly, but I didn't get enough points to pass the exam so I'll have to regroup and try again later this summer back at home.  After the exam, we went to dinner and then Wonder Works, which is an upside down (or appears so) building that houses many science experimental stations.  We had a lot of fun inside.  We thought of it as research since Emily's new job has a science specialization.

By the time we hit the hotel (after walking the 2 mile round trip from the hotel to Wonder Works), we were exhausted between the early start and the walking in the heat and humidity of central Florida.  This led to a very sound night of sleep with the A/C cranked to high.

More on Networkers as the week progresses.

Friday, June 13, 2008

Almost... But Not Quite

This morning the local radio station was running a contest for a $300 Gas Card.  The game was they had had a DJ hide out in the listening area.  Well as the yes or no clue questions were asked and answered I began to suspect that she was in my company (Passavant Hospital) parking lot.  After a little bit of circling I did find her, but didn't get through on the lines before another employee got through and got the prize.  It was kind of fun finding her and almost getting it.  Reminds me of the days that another station used to do "the little black box" contest where they would hide a box with a code somewhere in the area and give clues daily to find it.  The person that called in with the code won some money.  It was always fun to see everyone swarming the back roads to find it. :-)