My Recent "Tour" of the Microsoft Central Region
My friend Chris Koenig recently put up a post called "Microsoft Central Region - Who (and where) are you?" in which he shared the above image which I thought was worth re-sharing here. So what does this image show? It shows the "sub areas" within Microsoft's Central Region where the Evangelism teams focus. Chris, our Developer Evangelist from Dallas, covers Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Recently they've added some help for him in the geographically vast area via J Sawyer based in Houston. Both Houston and Dallas are huge markets for Microsoft and as such having a DE based in each of these cities will help run Chris a little less ragged.
Now, many of my readers are based in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, and we're spoiled because we see Chris on a regular basis because he is based here. But it is important to remember that he's just as responsible for the Little Rock, or Northwest Arkansas groups (not to mention Lubbock group) as he is for those in D/FW.
I was reviewing this map and realized that in the last several week's I've hit most of these areas, in fact all but the "Midwest Area". I've covered:
- North Central
- Minneapolis BizTalk 2006 R2 Launch
- Heartland Developer Conference
- Heartland Area
- Memphis Day of .NET
- South Central
- Little Rock .NET User Group
- VSLive! Austin
- Houston BizTalk 2006 R2 Launch
Here is what I can tell you after all traveling:
- My favorite Marriott hotel chain is the Fairfield Inn chain. Good breakfast (unlike Courtyards) and bright, happy rooms.
- My wife believes I've forgotten how to get home.
- My boss believes I've forgotten I'm a billable consultant.
- I believe that I'm seriously looking forward to vacation next week.