All the way from Australia, Microsoft MVP and Regional Director Adam Cogan will be joining us for a very special BONUS PADNUG presentation.

Looking forward to seeing you all there!

'Tis a busy time of year and there's just not enough days in this month. We do get paid more per day this month than most, though, so let's go blow that extra cash on a fine dining experience at the mall!

What: Portland Nerd Dinner
Where: Washington Square Food Court (Second Floor; typically, straight out from Picture People)
When: Tuesday, February 27, starting around 6:30 PM
Why: So the wallet doesn't get to thick and cause back problems.

Be There and Be Square!

All the way from Redmond, Washington, Keith Pleas will be joining us for a great discussion about the Enterprise Library.

Looking forward to seeing you all there!

Via Eric Gunnerson's blog, I just couldn't resist this challenge. I'm very pleased with my results !

The Veteran You scored 88%!

You've picked up the majority of the classic rock basics. You probably have a classic rock collection and can sing along with most of the songs on your local radio station. This is not the highest score, but it is arguably the best: that subtle combination of impressive knowledge and not being a pretentious geek.

My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 99% on notes

Link: The BASIC classic rock Test written by allmydays on OkCupid Free Online Dating.

From Jason's Blog:

XNA Game Studio Express has been released! XNA is the next generation of game development with .NET, and you can use GSE today to build games for Windows and Xbox 360. Everything you need for Windows game development is free. To run your games on the 360 you'll need to sign up for the XNA Creator's Club, which is $99/year and includes free content you can use for your games (like 3D models, source code, goo, etc).

If that isn't reason enough to start cranking out games, the Dream-Build-Play contest starts [this] month where you can win prizes and earn money for the XNA games you build. You may even end up with your game in the Xbox Live Arcade bringing in the bucks from royalties!

Looking forward to seeing you all there!

Wonderful weather we're having out this way! I suppose not everyone agrees; Greg doesn't seem to enjoy it as much as I do. Hey, in these modern times, I have full access to my work from home, so I don't find it necessary to leave the house.

Jesann had some fun... as you will see at the right, we now have a well-dressed snow-farmer sitting in the front yard ! She should get an award for this one.

As Greg mentions, there have been some exciting events around here, too. Not surprisingly, there have been many accidents and road related problems. This year, a gentleman near downtown Portland was able to capture several problems from his apartment. Derek Porter's Video can be reached by clicking the image on the left (although, the site has been up and down) and it is really amazing.

The video was submitted to KGW by a gentleman by the name of Derek Porter. Apparently, there was at least fifteen collisions and you just have to feel sorry (sorta) for the driver of the Volvo at the beginning of the clip. They said he was the only person to sustain any injuries and they were minor.

I feel so bad for Steve and the gang over the iPhone flap and the big Cisco Lawsuit. But, rather than whine about it, I thought I'd be a bit more proactive and help them out.

It's been a few years since 'e' was attached to everything hip. Maybe if we move the 'e' from the front to the back of the words, we would see a resurgence in it's use. With that in mind, I present my proposal for the new logo:

Well, it was bound to happen. I've reached The Answer today. I've only got two minutes to post this entry on my birthday, so I better hurry. How can I not post for this ostentatious occasion, though?

Happy 2007 Everyone!

It's shaken (not stirred) Martinis all year long folks and even though we can't have one at the mall, let's head out and have a Nerd Dinner! It'll give us a chance to exchange recipes in any event.

What: Portland Nerd Dinner
Where: Washington Square Food Court (Second Floor; typically, straight out from Picture People)
When: Thursday, January 11, starting around 6:30 PM
Why: Celebrate another New Year!

Be There and Be Square!

INETA has been kind enough to get Bill Vaughn to make the trip down to Portland to present to us this month. This is going to be a fabulous presentation and I expect to gain a lot of knowledge on this one.

Come out to this months meeting to learn about ADO.Net connecting.

WHAT:	December PADNUG Meeting
WHEN:	Wednesday 12/06/2006 6:00 p.m. Pizza (by INETA) 6:30 p.m. Presentation
WHERE:	PCC Auditorium at Capital Center 18640 NW Walker Road Beaverton, Oregon The auditorium is in room 1508 through entrance B. There is a $3 parking fee. The kiosk for paying for parking is located between entrances B and C.
WHO:	William (Bill) Vaughn An industry-recognized author, B will illustrate how to connect to SQL Server and other backend servers. He's been in the industry for over thirty years- working with mainframe,minicomputer and personal computer systems. Bill has written six editions of "Hitchhikers Guide to Visual Basic and SQL Server". Bill is a top-rated speaker and we are honored to have him.
TOPIC:	ADO.Net Connecting Learn how you can use connection options that can help your application connect quickly and stay connected as well as encrypt your connection string. The session includes examples of the new SqlConnectionStringBuilder, the new User instance feature of SQL Express and even funtionality like FullTextSearch and Reporting Services.

Looking forward to seeing you all there!

Hey, I like Amazon as much as the next person. I've bought a lot of stuff from them. I've complained about the "Recommendations" feature before, but haven't seen the "Better Together" get so mixed up. I wanted to look at the new Microsoft Mouse today:

How do these relate? Use the mouse as I watch the movie on my computer?

TechRepublic has one of my favorite series' of posters plus several other similar ones linked. Fun to check out.

 This is just awesome. They've done Star Wars in ASCII text animation. I can't imagine how long it takes to put this stuff together.

                         /__\                            /__\
                        | <><|         Look sir -       |><> |
                        (__/\)           droids.        (/\__)
                       /      \  /O                    /      \
                      //| __  \\//                     ||/(===o
                     // |/  \| \/                      | /  \ |
                    //__[][][]                         \/][][\/
               ____/|'  |\  /|.                         |\  /|
 ,---,_______ /         |_||_| \                        |_||_|
/|O O|      /           [ ][ ]   \                      [ ][ ]
 |O O|    /             | || |     \                    | || |
~~~~~ "          _______|_||_|_______\                  |_||_|
       " " " " "/       [_][__\        \________________[_][__\____

            |<   <<<   <<   1<   #   >1   >   >>   >>>   >|

It sounds like Cory Smith has one of those MVP MSDN Subscription cards available and he's giving it away!

The theme is "What would you do to get one?" and it's a great opportunity. Think about it... a subscription just in time for the release of Windows Vista and Office 2007. What more can you ask for?

The idea is to be creative... it doesn't sound like you would actually have to perform your act to win. But don't let me be the final say on that!

I noticed this evening that Microsoft's Live Local has increased the availability of "Bird's Eye" views. Even our house is in here. Now, as cool as this is, I guess I need to be even more careful of what I'm doing in the front yard!

Reading Paul Thurrott's WinInfo newsletter and saw this:

Microsoft Provides New Theme for Windows XP
Since the dawn of the Luna UI style in Windows XP, Microsoft had promised a variety of colorful themes to replace the stock three it shipped in the first version of the OS. It even toyed with graphics-based themes for holidays like Halloween before abandoning the project due to its complexity. Since then, only one new theme--Royale, part of Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005--has emerged. But this week, Microsoft shipped what we might assume to be the last official XP theme: Zune. As its name implies, the Zune theme is based around the Zune MP3 player, which is unfortunate. But it's pretty attractive looking, with black window, Start Menu, and taskbar treatments, and an orange Start Menu. And you can replace the lame Zune desktop wallpaper easily enough. You can download the new Zune XP theme from the Microsoft Web site.

What perfect timing! Just this week I downloaded the new Windows Media Player 11 and found that it just didn't fit my choices for color scheme. I'd been using the 'standard' XP Blue Theme and switched to Silver, but WMP was just a little too "Vista-ish" for XP.

Well, the Zune Theme solves this. Compare:

<-- Before                 After-->

I'm just so darn happy! Hey, it's the little things that count.