Fourty-Four

I turned 44 today. Life is sad.

Sitting ducks in San Francisco

Just been in San Francisco for a few days. On business, I should add. A database company paid for the ticket and because they're nice they book me in business class. If they hadn't done that I'd probably be dead or in jail for freaking out in the airplane.

Here's what happened. Leaving San Jose at 11 for a 14:30 departure from SFO on Lufthansa to Frankfurt. Breezing up on I280 without a problem, dropping off the Hertz car with no problem, hopping on the new train (which is nice because the car rental companies finally quit charging 12 bucks for a freakin shuttle bus). I go to the check-in counter, drop my bags, get my ticket, post a few letters, hang out in the lounge for a half hour... everything's pretty much eventless. We board the plane 20 minutes before scheduled departure, although it's a 747, still no reason to worry about a thing.

Finally, everybody is aboard, captain comes on and does his welcome thing and announces there is a slight problem that they need to fix before they can take off. It'll be a few minutes before they'd know what it is. Having seen these checkup failures often, I think, oh well, they'll figure it out soon. I have my first orange juice and nuts. PA crackles again, captain says, well, it's more serious, something with the flaps, and it'll be a little longer before they figure out how to fix it. A few raised eyebrows here and there, mostly from the seasoned travellers.

A few magazine pages later, captain announces, they need to replace a part, which will take 1.5 hours, because they first need to find that part, they believe they can get it from United. Oh shit. There goes my connection in Frankfurt already.

Why is it that these estimates are always wrong? About 2 hours later, captain says they found the part, it's on its way to the plane and they will immediately install it. Duh! Of course, I thought, they have a nice lunch first and then a siesta before going to work. Another hour goes by, people start getting vocal about sitting in the plane for 3 hours and why we are not allowed to deplane. I have some work to do, but my laptop battery runs dry now, and because the engines ain't running, the in-seat power supply is off. So that's that. I have another drink and a sandwich that they brought in from some airport deli, and flip through the Chronicle. Another hour and captain announces the part is installed, but they need to do more calibration or something and he thanks for our patience. By then, it's running thin. Captain again through the speakers, now they fixed the flap thing, but while doing that they found another problem. Great. I don't remember whether I didn't wanna listen anymore or just forgot, but I'm getting more cynical by the minute. Two nice Chinese ladies (Alice and Flo) across the aisle and I start talking to the flight attendants that this getting nowhere. They gives us more drinks and another bag of cashews.

It's now about 6 hours after departure time and flight attendants are getting dressed again. Captain goes on the PA and says, they will not be able to fix the problem in the near future, and the flight attendant's shift would become too long even if we would fly, so he cancels the flight altogether. At least we know now. We are getting off, like a herd of sheep, and are directed to the check-in counters where we were earlier in the day. 400 people now stand all in front of 5 counters. The economy passengers wind halfway through the airport, even the business class line snakes around a few times. An agent gives instructions that boarding will resume the next day at 9am for a noon departure. The locals are free to go home. So I get stuck in the line because I need a hotel. They give everyone a piece of paper with a hotel voucher. I'm in the Crowne Plaza (which is OK), not sure where they drop the eco passengers. Now I have to get my bag back, too! So all 400 people go down a level and wait at the baggage claim belts for their stuff. What a mess. My bag comes out after 15 minutes, now I have to go back up a level, because the hotel shuttles leave from the departure level (kinda stupid). Of course, the hotel shuttle is a tiny bus for 20 people or so, and typically not with lots of bags. Takes another hour until I'm at the hotel. Check-in is thankfully fairly quick, but it's approaching 10pm and the restaurant is about to close. Alice, Flo and another fellow passenger, Anita, and I are lucky to be one of the last parties allowed before the manager locks the restaurant. Other passengers push their noses against the windows and start a riot outside. We order quickly, and wait (another hour, what were you thinking?) for a few appetizers. We have good fun over dinner, trying to avoid conversations about the big mess and the complications it caused. Flo and Alice are going on vacation, and that was reduced by one day, Anita is stripped of her day for recovery before starting a new job, and I have to cancel and move tons of meetings in an already full calendar.

After more than 12 hours since I left the house that morning, I hit the mattress, exhausted from not flying.

Upstaged by Barbarella and her sisters

Last week, I did a presentation at the Dutch Business Objects user conference in Amsterdam. I was surprised by the large number of attendees (over 400) for a country-specific gathering, but I was more surprised by the liberal attitude of this corporate event. Now, the "Oranje" always had a reputation for taking themselves not so serious, but outside the Netherlands this would be probably considered a faux-pas. Between the country manager, who did his intro speech, and myself, four girls in pink tights and "Madonna bras" (don't know what to call these devices otherwise) and platinum-blond wigs entered the stage with loud whistling and drumming. For 15 minutes, a deafening noise stunned the audience (myself included) from the beating on drums and barrels, supported by a blasting PA, fire breathing, and flying sparks from angle grinders.

"And now for something completely different..." Kinda hard to talk about the business intelligence market after that performance. However, on the positive side, I didn't have anybody sleeping during my pitch...

A new job ... or is it?

Today is my first day with Gartner. The deal of the META Group acquisition has finally closed and I will join the Business Intelligence / Data Warehousing team as VP Research. Most of the other analysts in Gartner I do know already, but it's particularly nice that my colleagues David Newman, Kurt Schlegel, and Mark Beyer also made the transition.

Coverage-wise I don't expect too many changes. It'll still be mostly business intelligence, data integration, and data quality. The challenge will be to get used to the new systems, processes, regulations, etc. A few weeks from now, I need to go to Stamford; that's when I'll get assimilated by the Borg.