16 September 2010

Going to OOW2010 - Long Wednesday

Wednesday morning at 5 o'clock as the day begins, the alarm clock wakes me. Time to get out, take a shower and get ready to go to Oracle Open World. Not only my first Oracle Open World, but also the first time that I will be invited to the Oracle Ace Directors Briefing. Looking forward to an exciting week and a half in and around San Francisco.

Last time I went to the USA (ODTUG in Washington, DC) the kids had a hard time. Because I had to leave in the middle of night (around 03:00 AM) I had to say goodbye the night before. After that they had a hard time getting to sleep. This time I planned to do things different. They were coming with me to the train station, say goodbye there so at least they could get a good night sleep.
It's been a while that I took the train anywhere, and this time I had the opportunity to go on a high speed train from Rotterdam to Schiphol Airport. "Because of the one year anniversity of Fyra (the train company) you will get a complimentary coffee". Excellent! Too bad I had to get off the train before I encountered the catering. Oh well,... The whole trip only took a little over an hour to get to the airport, nice.
Meeting my colleague Lucas Jellema at the airport, getting some work done for our joint presentation.Meeting Lonneke Dikmans and Mike van Alst at the gate.
The flight was smooth, planned on doing some work but watched movies instead.
The view from the hotel room on the ninth is fantastic, overlooking a lake and Oracle HQ right behind that (I will post a picture later).
Dinner was good, met up with Chris Muir, Richard Foote, Marcel Kratochvil, Lucas Jellema and Mike van Alst.
Because it was only 08:30 PM (local time) I felt it was too early to go to bed so I joined Chris to the bar. Debra Lilley and some other Oracle Ace Directors but I really couldn't keep my eyes open. Time to call defeat and go to bed.
Thursday morning at 5 o'clock (not local time, but time back home... it was only nine local time) I fell asleep.

Update 18 September:
Finally,... here's the photo:

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