2007 brought some interesting challenges and adventures for Susan and I. As the year comes to a close it’s time to recount some of those items and some of the interesting number
The year started off a little slow with a fun trip to NYC to see the amazing Les Paul play guitar at 91 years old! This was followed by a trip to Redmond for a few weeks to participate in testing out some new products.
February brought an opportunity to go to St. Thomas (US Virgin Islands) for work. Susan and I took a few days off and made it a mini-vacation. What a great time of year to head down there as it is cold in the north east. This was followed by a NASTY cold that kept both Susan and I bedridden. The end of the month and into March was a stressful time at work as we struggle to patch computers for the Daylight Saving Time (DST) changes in the US. There were many a sleepless not and countless man hours dedicated to the effort. After the DST fun, I had an offsite in Las Vegas. It was nice to relax for a few days.
April buried me in a tremendous amount of work as I was finishing up graduate school. By the end of the month I had completed the program through Boston University and achieved a Master of Science degree in Computer Information Systems with a concentration in Information Security. By the time May rolled around I was ready to blow off some steam and I went to 4 moe. shows in 5 days in NYC.
June brought a unique opportunity to deliver a workshop in Asia for other Microsoft employees. I tacked on two weeks of vacation and Susan came with me for 3 amazing weeks in Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand. (check out the blog posts from June and July for more details)
In July we went down to North Carolina for a week at the beach with Susan’s siblings and her dad and Julia. This was followed by a trip to Seattle for Tech Ready 5 and time in Colorado seeing friends and a moe. show. I also got to see my first rodeo and first time in Wyoming. The remainder of July and August brought countless hours of relaxation at Susan’s mom and Tommy’s pool.
The end of September and early October Susan had a conference in Huntington Beach, California. I tagged along and was able to meet up with my cousins that I haven’t seen in 18 years! We celebrated our 1 year anniversary out there as well.
Later in October Susan had another trip in Denver. The Colorado Rockies were playing in the World Series and it was a crazy time. We spent time with friends and visited Rocky Mountain National Park again.
November was a life changing month. 
It started off with my father and I going to our first Devils game at the new arena in Newark. Also, I turned 30 and we went to Paris and Amsterdam to celebrate. (Thanks Mom and Dad!!!) I saw my 30th moe. show on my 30th birthday. As if Amsterdam wasn’t enough, Susan had planned a surprise birthday party for me when we got home.
Rounding out the year, December was busy with the holidays. We had our annual Toys for Tots party which was our most successful ever! I spent time in Burlington, Vermont for work under 2 feet of snow and enjoyed every minute of it. The end of the month was spent with friends and family and brought everything back into perspective.
2007 was a great year and I look forward to 2008 being even better! Let’s take a look at the numbers (in no order):
- 1 – the Anniversary we celebrated this year
- 6 – countries we visited
- 4 – National Parks visited
- 30 – the birthday that I celebrated this year
- 13 – moe. shows I saw this year
- over 7000 – pictures taken this year that we are still sorting out
- 42 – hours to return from Asia (Chiang Rai to Bangkok to Kuala Lumpur to Dubai to New York)
- 9 – babies born to friends and family
- 6 – Blue Whales spotted on our trip in California
- 88 – nights spent in Marriott hotels this year
- $520 – worth of toys collected from our annual Toys for Tots party which was then matched by Microsoft!
-Allen
