Though I’m a day late to the conference, it was more than enough to spend some good quality time with my team and enjoy the conference and also meet up with some of my friends.
I stayed at the Parker guest house by recommendation and the place is really nice and quiet. Every guest was respectful and nice. I wish I brought cash so that I could have tipped them. I’ll know for the next time around.
I met up with the team the next day and we did some sessions and also walked the expo floor, which I always forget how big it is, it’s like 4-5 blackhat conventions all in 1. We had to say our hellos to certain vendors and friends and of course our newbies wanted a lot of the free crap there. I couldn’t believe I only took home like 6 stickers. For lunch, we left and went to the pier to eat. We also did a little bit of sightseeing, like checking out the wharf, watching the herd of seals, and going out to the Golden Gate bridge for photos. At the end of the day, we were discombobulated and most went about their own way. I took advantage of that and went to go see Steve and Kelly at their house, they had a friend coming over and they made dinner.
Kelly is so fancy with making appetizers that were amazing and we drank some wine. Some great conversation around the dinner that was delish, and listened to some vinyl records.
At the end of the night, it was time for me to go, so they ordered me a Waymo. Too funny since my coworkers were all abuzz on wanting to ride in one and are all put on the waiting list. I had to share the video with them so they could be jelly.
The next morning, up and at’em. I had breakfast at the hotel, how wonderful it was, and nice and quiet. Then made my way to the gang who already were in line for Jason Sudeikis. Obviously we’re huge Ted Lasso fans. When they let us in, we basically ran to the front. Lane joined us, so I got to see my boss, but you can tell he was tired. After some time wasting advertisements by sponsors of the RSA, we finally got to see Jason and that was just fun to hear him talk of his show. When we got out of there, Lane had some things to go do to prep for his dinner with whomever. We knew that might be the last we saw of him so we said our goodbyes. We then all took off to do some hanging out, drinking, networking, dinner, and then hanging out and drinking some more.
We said our goodbyes and the next day, it was just my buddy and I. We decided to lunch together and since my exercise count was low for over a week now, I chose to walk to the lunch spot. OMG San Francisco hills are no joke. I had to stop and smell the flowers so it didn’t look like I was gonna pass out. Lunch was amazing but then I got a message from the boss and had to go back to the hotel quickly to take care of some stuff.
While looking at my email, I saw i could move my flight up, so I did and before I knew it, I was booked for early morning. I also saw that I had a dinner that night with a vendor. Well, that’s neat, I didn’t have to order food.
Dinner was delicious at the Boulevard. I kept things easy so that I could make sure I didn’t oversleep. When I got back to the hotel, I finished packing and flew home early the next day.