Agile Deep Dive at MIT Sponsored by GBC/ACM Part 2
I'm now sitting in a hotel in Rutland, VT. First, in an aside, let me say I understand my wife's comment when I said I was coming to Rutland for a week. She went to school at University of Vermont and law school at Vermont Law and worked as a prosecutor at Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation (possibly out of Rutland- I'm not sure). Her response was
"Rutland, ugggh"
Now I understand. It's a lot like Helena, Montana but in Vermont and with fewer 'payday loan' facilities. If you have never been to Helena, well, it's a lot like Rutland. Rutland is not what you think of when you think of Vermont and Helena is not what you think of when you think of Montana unless you happen to be reciting the state capitals of the United States.
Let me move on to something that is actually relevant to the title.
I sort of attended the conference listed in this post's title. The only thing about it that was deep was my disappointment. Perhaps I didn't give it much of a chance but I looked at the rest of the agenda for the day and a half that I abandoned and saw nothing going very deep. This was NOT a deep dive. It was an introduction or maybe best described as an overview. In all fairness I'm sure it didn't help that I had already seen and heard all of Jeff Sutherland's material on Scrum. In all fairness to myself and the other participants the conference should not have been called a Deep Dive.
If this is any indicator I spent half the day on a beautiful Saturday at the conference and was able to get a proposal put together on my notebook during that time. I hate writing up proposal. What does that tell you about my interest in the conference. Then I bolted to Harvard Square to stop at the Coop looking for a specific book. Had some lunch in the sun on the steps right there in the center of Harvard Square ingesting not only my food but all the beauty of Harvard Square- the people. I especially loved the guy sitting on the sidewalk, donation can in front of him, holding a sign that said 'Spare change for Weed' as he beckoned 'Support Central America.' After my lunch I bolted. Not back to the conference but home to spend time with the family. After looking at the agenda there was no reason to be there Saturday afternoon. Getting home I looked at Sunday's agenda and decided again it was not a good use of time.
Other than giving me a reason to hang out near the Charles and drop in on Harvard Square, thus brining back all the reasons I had loved living in Cambridge, the conference was a bust and a snorkeling venture not a deep dive.