Greetings from Cork, Ireland! I wanted to get a quick post out about my next 3-4 speaking opportunities before I take a little late summer/early fall break from speaking (for a very good reason). We’ll get to that at the end.
First of all, I’m here in Cork, Ireland to speak at SQL Saturday Ireland in a couple of days (June 9th, to be exact). I’m really excited about this opportunity, as it’s the second international SQL Saturday I’ve been able to do this year. I am incredibly grateful for these opportunities to speak to new audiences and will do my very best to not let down the attendees and organizers. Cork has been wonderful in the few hours I’ve been here already and I look forward to a few more hours of exploring Cork tomorrow before the speaker get-together ramps up in the evening. If you haven’t registered for #SQLSATCORK yet, you can do so here.
Following Saturday’s event here in Ireland, I’m thrilled to announce that I’ve been selected to two SQL Saturday events in July which are much closer to home than the roughly 4000 miles it is to my house from where I sit here in Cork. I’ll be speaking at SQL Saturday Louisville on July 21st and SQL Saturday Columbus on July 28th.
Louisville was the first SQL Saturday to ever select me and remain grateful to Chris, John, Mala and the team for that initial selection and the community path it’s put me from that point forward. Beyond my personal feelings for this event and the group behind it, rest assured that Louisville is always a fantastic event with a great speaker list top to bottom despite my repeated selections! If you haven’t registered for the event, click here. I’d also like to plug the pre-conference session from two ex-colleagues of mine (and current Microsoft employees), Brad Ball and Josh Luedeman. These guys are doing very cool, cutting-edge stuff in Azure to really make your data warehouse data come alive to data consumers. Their dovetailing of data visualizations, sentiment analysis, and modern DW techniques is worth a day of your time – register for it here.
This will be my first trip to Columbus for SQL Saturday and I’m excited about that because A) I lived in Westerville for a few years when I was a kid and B) I’m a frequent visitor to Columbus Crew matches with my son so it will be fun to present up there. I’ll also be getting together with my fellow FGE Professional Sports Analytics founder (George Bryant) to watch some football after the event at a Crew pub, so the whole day should be a blast from start to finish. I haven’t been able to speak too much about what George and I are doing with FGE, but if you’re interested in what we’re doing, click here. We’re a bit light on the details there for now, but rest assured there are many blog posts coming from the work he and I are doing. Good bit of our work is under layers of legally enforced silence – for now. That will soon change and I’m eager to share it with you when I can!
Next, I’ve submitted individual sessions to SQL Saturday Indianapolis and I’m eagerly awaiting that schedule to see if I’ve been selected. Even if I miss out on an individual session, I do know that I will be doing a pre-con on Friday, August 10 with my friend and co-worker Sean Werick. It’s titled “Modernize your Data Warehouse” and tickets are available here. It’s always fun to be in Indy even when I’m not at the Speedway so I hope I’ll see you there.
Finally, I’ve submitted to the Atlanta Azure DataFest, held August 16th and 17th at the Microsoft Technology Center in Alpharetta. I’m hoping I am selected for that event because I’ve submitted my Cognitive Services, Azure Logic Apps, sentiment analysis, and soccer/football talk (i.e. the Premier League Mood Table session). That’s received wonderful response where I’ve given it across the USA and the world but it doesn’t always fit neatly into some PASS events so I’m hoping it finds a home at Azure DataFest.
Following that, I won’t be at any SQL Saturdays for a couple months so I can be home on the weekends to see my son play with his U10 club soccer (to some readers)/football (to other readers) team representing Lexington FC. I’m incredibly proud of the level he is able to play the sport that he loves, and despite my woeful lack of talent in that area, I can’t wait to watch him take to the field this fall. Thanks for reading – hopefully more to come soon!