Sorry readers, I was having some many adventures there was no June edition.  In May, I had SQLSaturday Dallas where I got to drive a pickup truck because what else would you drive in Texas.  I presented my newest and most popular related series of blog posts Collecting Performance Metrics the Spartanburg User Group, I had the opportunity to participate in IDERA Live Virtual conference and presented to the Michiana local user group.  I also attended my little brother’s graduation in Kentucky, hence the less traveling for me.  I enjoyed my time with family.  I got play chauffer for one another speaker while in Dallas and visit Deep Ellum and experience some of the local atmospheres.   Right after getting back from brother’s graduation was time for SQLSatuday LA which I took as a chance to take my son on vacation (he has always wanted to go there not me) and then SQLSaturday Houston.  For all my readers, that have to drive in LA traffic I’m sorry.  For the truck driver that hit my rental car, please don’t run any more red lights.  I’m still my getting my mojo back on driving after a second truck had hit me this year.  I came back from LA totally exhausted having seen lots of things but super vigilant after the truck hit me on day 3 of 10.  Not to mention it was the second rental, with first having the rear mirror just pop off and dangle from the ceiling in the Walgreens parking lot.  The second car that the truck hit I only had like 10 minutes.  But the third car managed to last 7 days so things got better. Oh best of all I found Nemo, he or she isn’t lost anymore they were just in an aquarium in LA.

I spent most of June very sleepy from being on vacation and writing a chapter for an upcoming book (more details to come).  But I did manage to read 4 books over May and June.   I read Culture Code: The Secret of Highly Success Groups and Herding Tigers: Be the Leader That Creative People Need.  Both books talked about building a culture where people were encouraged to their best and flourish, I highly recommend Culture Code if you looking to lead a team and build a culture they want to part of.  Then in June, I read George Washington on Leadership and Peak Performance: Elevate Your Game, Avoid Burnout, and Thrive with the New Science of Success.  Highly recommend reading Peak Performance but the one takeaway I took from it the need for rest which doesn’t necessarily mean sitting around and doing nothing, but just doing something else besides what you normally work on.  Reminds of a book I read last year called Rest: Why You Get More Work Done When You Work Less. So, I’ve made a commitment to myself to get back into exercising and actually using my lunch hour each day at work.

As part of my superhero duties, I did visit all my foster kids and have a couple of court dates.  I also picked up a new case so that puts me up to three.  Unfortunately, some of my kids are in group homes so not placed close to me do just this Saturday to complete two visits I left home at 8:30 AM and got back at 5:30 PM and all but 2.5 hours of that was driving.  I officially have my first kid placed out of state (just over the border) but I’m still going to make my visits.

I did change jobs two weeks ago to Broadvine, a hotel management SaaS company, after 4.5 years at ChannelAdvisor.  It was time for me to take on a new challenge.  So let’s see what the future holds at the new job.

This month on WeSpeakLinux we have Argenis Fernandez (t) speaking on Linux running on Containers so go please register for that if you haven’t.

Camry vs Truck, never ends well but no one was serious injured in though we did get to do a 180, and I was so shocked when it happened I didn’t even know what hit us

Santa Monica Pier