The week that is.....

It's fair to say this week has been (and continues to be!) a whirl of corporate Xmas parties!  A real highlight had to be the bar featured on the left.  This was a totally charming, unexpected adventure.  The "Team" (aka me, Liz and Melissa) had our end of project dinner.  We started at a "speak easy".  This was awesome on a bunch of levels, not least of which because this place involves secret passwords, "hidden" doors and fabulous cocktails.  It's all based around the prohibition days. You book a table online and when you receive confirmation of your reservation you get a password ..... arriving at the venue there are no signs, just a door with a buzzer.  You buzz and someone opens the door (but not too far) to check you out, asks you the password and checks your ID, only then can you go inside where you are immediately immersed in this delightfully warm, cozy world of 1920s music and delightful service.  It's not at all pretentious and just unexpectedly easy fun.  And that was just beginning.
Given we are a small team we were able to book ourselves into one of the BEST restaurants I have ever been to. Gary Danko is this gorgeous restaurant that serves gorgeous food!  In a very American moment Melissa discovered that our server was from her College and (yay to College ties) as a result we got a complimentary and delicious bottle of dessert wine at the end of the meal.  Of course, weirdly, Liz realized one of the servers was the brother of one of our work colleagues.......seriously how big do we suppose this country is after all????  Anyway enough to say that we spent several very lovely hours laughing, eating and drinking!
Wednesday night was the Cisco Account Team function where around 250 people land in a restaurant and.....yep, more eating, more drinking and more laughing (this, I might add, was the third meal of the week having already gone out with some folk from work for a meal on Monday).  Unfortunately (or fortunately) I had a head cold hit me during the day so wasn't really up for a big night BUT along the way have managed to secure my next project.....not at Cisco!
Come January I am heading off to Net App.  We are just in the process of setting up a team there so it's one of those "hmmm, lets see we need to build this thing out".......perfect for me!  I am seeing it as an opportunity to prove (and test) myself in new ways.  I've been at Cisco three years so it will be good to go somewhere else (or at least I think it will).  It's in Sunnyvale which is still in Silicon Valley and a slightly shorter commute than I currently have.  All new, all exciting and all full of possibilities and I get to stay involved in some of the business dev stuff I have been doing.
Friday is drinks with my old Account Manager and recruiter from TechProse - love those girls, they are a riot and love love love good wine.......so we have chosen somewhere yummy looking right on the Embarcadero (I've run past it more times than I care to remember so very excited to actually be going inside this time).
Saturday......more food extravaganza, but will share that story next time and have some photos too!