Embedded Systems Conference, Boston-Captain's Log Day 2

First full day of the Embedded Systems Conference and I have 3 words for you-“MY FEET HURT”!!  When does anyone ever stand for 9 hours straight??  We’ll I guess some people do, but I certainly haven’t developed whatever you need to develop to endure all the standing.  Discomfort aside, Day one of the show was AWESOME!

We all got to the booth early for our last minute setup agenda and training on the show services lead scanner (RFID very cool, although a little temperamental, but mostly because we were probably burning it up trying to scan all our visitors faster than it could handle!!).  When the opening announcement was made the crowd started trickling in.  Frankly, everyone was a little worried that it might be slow; I guess we’re all a bit wary after this year’s tough economic conditions, but before we could commiserate, we were inundated with eager attendees.   Our team was on their game; we had experts from Lantronix, Telit, Silvertel and Fujitsu on hand along with our own tech team.  All who visited had the opportunity to learn about new product s and have all their questions answered.   We had people in the booth and lots of clusters in the aisles, so much so that it was hard to pass.  We were by far one of the busiest booths in our section, and our neighbors didn’t seem to mind the entire ruckus as they benefited from much of the overflow.  We were definitely the coolest party on the block, it was a sight to see, if only I could have had a few free moments to take some pictures and post them to Twitter!!  I’ve got to get better at that!

We heard about many interesting new applications (remote monitoring of tropical fish tanks using Telit…how cool is that?),   MIT being in the vicinity, certainly keeps the brain power at this show high.  It’s amazing how many innovative products are enabled by the products we sell, we really have the most awesome jobs, and it’s so invigorating to talk shop with the fine people who attend ESC!

At 6pm the cocktail reception begins, and everyone enjoys a much deserved glass of wine or beer together, afterwards, we were off to a great dinner at Antonio’s in Beacon Hill….did I mention 22 of us crowd in to this tiny neighborhood Italian restaurant!  It was quite a Bacchanal!  The staff at Antonio’s served us an incredible meal, I can assure you no one will forget the Grand Marnier shrimp (and I have it on good authority that people have been known to stuff those babies in their pockets…they are that good).  After the feast, all 22 two of us took over a nearby bar and continued the festivities, most of which I cannot share, what happens in Boston, stays in Boston!  (Seriously, good clean fun, but some of it was absolutely hilarious!)…The herd started thinning at about 1am, but rumor has it that a few diehards actually went for pizza at 3:30am!!  Tomorrow’s going to be interesting!!!

Happy first day of Autumn