[Previous entry: "Life at Westwood Village Condos"] [Main Index] [Next entry: "Brighton Daddy Long-legs"]

07/30/2004 Entry: "Geek Dinner Report"

We had a good time at the Geek Dinner last night! I was impressed by Dan Appleman and his new book, Always Use Protection: A Teen's Guide to Safe Computing. I bought a copy and had it signed for my sister and nephew. Dan gave us the quiz and I got most of the questions right. We ate at the Tap House Grill after finding that Rock Bottom Brewery had a half-hour wait. They were very patient with our large party and our tablehopping and rearranging ourselves constantly, and I liked the turkey chop salad! (It's not the cheapest place going, though.) Our more usual food court venue for these events is really much better (more flexible seating, quieter, cheaper) but Dan's reading was scheduled at the downtown Bellevue Barnes and Noble so we had to fit in with that.

It was fun meeting new folks and seeing old friends. Roland and Eric did make it down from BC; Roland and I talked about lindy hop and a future blog conference he might be putting on. After Brian told me several times that he only blogs about once a month, I made sure he met Jeannie who also blogs at that pace or less. Jack talked with Sean whose family-owned machine shop accessories company may need some consulting work. When I asked another guy why he'd decided to come to the event, he said "I'm the only geek at my company, and I wanted to talk with other geeks!" Quote from Sam Gentile (oops, he says Dan said this): "Anyone still using C++ these days ought to be shot! It's a buffer overrun waiting to happen!" Jerry Kindall was there; I amazed the folks near me at the other end of the table by being able to repeat his self-intro without hearing it, because I could see his gestures and knew what he would be likely to say: he works a few blocks away and has a weblog. Total attendance was over twenty.

Posted by Sam Gentile @ 08/06/2004 07:37 PM PST

Richard, I'll try if I remember. These events aren't on a regular schedule, they happen when Robert thinks of it or someone is visiting.

Posted by Anita @ 07/30/2004 09:26 PM PST

Anita: I've been trying to attend this dinner for a few months. My biggest problem is that I usually don't find out that it's happening until a few days before or just after it's happened.

I know it's a lot to ask, but do you think you might shoot me an e mail when you hear about the next one.

I read Scobie's blog but not regularly enough to hear about the dinners in a timely way.

By the by, I love Roland's Vaneats blog ( http://www.vaneats.com/ ) about the Vancouver BC food scene. It's superb.

Posted by Richard Silverstein @ 07/30/2004 08:09 PM PST