Bazaarvoice’s end of quarter was this past Friday and it was crazy. One part of our craziness is we go absolutely insane with the color green (increasingly more so as the last day in the quarter approaches):

Our sales team rocked it this quarter and whooped their goal on the last day. I had to leave early on Friday, but I hear they got sand and beer to have a boat/beach themed party on the top of the parking garage… haha.

Friday night, I went to Orange & White with Melissa. I figured I would feel old, but that feeling wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be (probably since I had never been to O&W before). I’m kind of a lame date to a dance (especially with an ankle that limits certain movement), but Melissa put up with me. =p

Before the dance, we went to dinner at the Belmont which was okay (I wouldn’t have any urges to go again). Atmosphere was not bad, though. I think the Spazmatics were playing next door, so there was some sweet 80’s music going on. BV would be happy that we were still sporting green throughout the night (okay, that wasn’t exactly intentional).

I hear the dance was scaled down this year and there was only one ice sculture… here it is in all its glory (not sure how glorious it is, but if it has any, it’s all in this photo):

Saturday, I did a lot of nothing. The marketing department at BV gave me a $50 AMEX gift certificate for loaning them my 5DMII, so I headed to Fry’s in an attempt to spend it. I was thinking of getting Entourage, but they didn’t have it. I thought about Curb Your Enthusiasm and 30 Rock as well, but the prices were so much higher than Amazon, that I decided not to. I walked out with the $50 untouched. Fry’s fail. After that, there was dinner and dessert with Ryan, his parents, and some of the BV gang. I took a few pics, but they didn’t turn out so great, so I won’t be posting them. =p

Sunday, I got my hair cut, watched 500 Days of Summer and ate mangos.

This past week, Bazaarvoice had its annual US Social Commerce Summit where I served as photographer again. It was pretty cool, with Google being our platinum sponsor, but also pretty tiring. You can view my photos in my flickr set, but here are a few:

After the summit, I took the rest of the week off to chill and recharge. I did mostly nothing, but I did cheat a little and showed up to my team’s offsite to hang with them for a bit at Crown & Anchor:

Friday night, I went to Uchi with Al, Eduardo, and Scotty, which was pretty tasty as expected then went to meet up with Melissa at Sarina’s birthday party… where I spent about 30+ minutes trying to find parking in west campus… oh west campus…

I started to mess with Aperture 3 and decided to make the switch from Lightroom over to it. I was experimenting with the pics above and also reedited some shots from when I went to Salt Lick with some BVers (that batch happened to be on my laptop when I was looking for photos to play with). I think the Salt Lick ones turned out pretty well.

I’m still getting used to having control of curves in the individual RGB channels, but I’m liking it lots so far. =) Good job, Apple.

Some other random tid bits:

• finally got around to watching Slumdog Millionaire


• started using Time Machine for backups on my iMac


• looked at reviews for Canon’s 1D Mark IV, but promptly stopped deciding it was too dangerous (don’t think I could give up full frame, anyways)


• watched a few classes about iPhone app development on Stanford’s iTunes U


• went to the Glee sing-along at the Drafthouse

I’ve probably left stuff out, but whatever… you’ll live. =)

We made name tags at work today! Here’s mine:

And here’s Al’s:

I saw Avatar in IMAX 3D and I enjoyed it more than the first (at least because my high expectations weren’t crushed)… probably wouldn’t see it a third time though. =)

I’ve returned from our 14th and last Bazaarvoice All-Hands at the Alamo Drafthouse (we’ll be too big to fit next time). It’s sad to leave as it’s been a great quarterly tradition thus far. On the plus side, our next one will be at Salt Lick! YESSSSSS… MEEEAAATTTT…

Speaking of which, I broke down and purchased meatcation.com. Not sure what I’m going to do with it yet, but I have it. =) Maybe I’ll just make it a documentary of our (hopefully) annual Meatcation…

Back on the topic of the All-Hands, I was awarded a Darth Vader TIE Fighter LEGO set from the product group, and a culture award (2000 stock options). I must say that I am greatly honored to have received both of these (one likely worth quite a bit more than the other in monetary terms, but one a lot more fun to play with right now). I was incredibly surprised when I stood up to receive my award and was greeted by a freakin’ standing ovation. You guys are ridiculous. I can’t express how appreciative I am in words, but since I’m not a telepath, a very deep thank you to you all. =) Seriously, I don’t know if I’ll ever have a work experience like this again and you all make it awesome.

On a down note, I’m still not fully recovered from the cold I caught going to Seattle, so I will have to skip out on going to Dallas with Heather, Ryan and Steph (need to come up with a name for that group…) and eating lots of food. =(

With that, I will end with photos from the last Bazaarvoice All-Hands at the Alamo…

The rest are here.

I’m quite disappointed that I managed to get sick on my way to Seattle, but other than that the trip was overall pleasant. My immune system has plummeted in recent years it seems… that, or I expose myself to riskier conditions… who knows.

Tomorrow (or rather, later today) is our quarterly All-Hands at the Drafthouse. This will likely be the last time it’s at the Drafthouse as we’ve grown too large for it. =(

Here’s hoping this annoying cough goes away…

I’m off to Seattle later today (Tuesday) on business, but hopefully I’ll have some amount of fun. =)

This past weekend, we had our usual ultimate in somewhat cold weather, but it was fun anyways. I don’t exactly recall what I did between ultimate and that night, but I do know Sam summoned me to pick his drunk butt up from downtown late at night. I brought along Chancy to pick him up and well, let’s just say Sam made the trip home quite interesting. ;)

I had a conversation with Nancy about dating and I had the idea of going on a date and playing a “deal breaker or not” game where you basically take turns listing aspects about yourself that you think could be deal breakers and the other person says it is or isn’t. I figure this is probably a short term lose-lose situation as the game would either be really boring or get awkward really quickly once you hit a deal breaker. On the plus side, I suppose it will help you in the long run not waste any time. ;) I’m totally just joking, by the way.

Went to Vox again on Sunday, had lunch at Jim’s with a few peeps then went up to Round Rock for a bit. That night, chilled with Ryan, Heather and Steph by playing way too much hearts and watching Enchanted, which I found amusing. That movie’s genius on Disney’s part with all the recycling they were able to do. I fell asleep in a lovesac, which I apparently humped pretty good. For the record, I’d like to say I burrowed, not humped…

For all of my cyber-stalkers out there thinking they can invade my house while I’m gone, you better watch out. Ryan’s still there and he’ll possibly bite your face off.

I will now end this post with an excerpt from an “artist” who has one of the highest ratios of ridiculous lyrics per character ever.

“He was a skater boy
She said see you later boy
He wasn’t good enough for her
She had a pretty face
But her head was up in space
She needed to come back down to earth” - Avril Lavigne

That song’s called Sk8ter Boi. I’m not joking. Ridiculous.

For a variety of reasons, I’m pretty drained right now, so I am looking forward to passing out shortly.

I want to give a shout out to my Bazaarvoice peeps for a hard-worked EOQ. I feel like we’re set to do well in the following quarters and I look forward to growing even more (particularly in tech services). DSB, BV!

Also, this is another reason why I <3 my company:

In other news, I’m headed to Seattle next week for work. I think this’ll be my first time to Seattle, so we’ll see how it goes. I’ve heard generally good things. =)

“Oh oh it’s magic
When I’m with you (Oh-o, it’s magic)
Oh oh it’s magic, just a little magic (gotta be magic)
You know it’s true
I got a hold on you” - The Cars

A picture is worth a thousand words… even if it’s a screenshot of words.

I will consider myself blessed if I’m fortunate enough to work with a group like my BV team in future endeavors. Cheers!

Rest of the photos here.

Friday was a good day. Started the day with our quarterly Bazaarvoice All-Hands at the Alamo Drafthouse (South Lamar, which we will soon have to move from because we’ve filled it up). Congratulations to all my team members who won awards! Here are some photos!

Then, we had our holiday party early (so we could celebrate with our international teams who flew in this week) at the Driskill.

They had scallops, which I consider to be the bacon of the sea!

Then, some of us closed the evening by chilling at Jim’s for a while.

Ah… in the words of Steve Balmer…

“I have four words for you. I love this company, yes!!!”

I have a few video clips… I might get around to uploading them all eventually, but for now… here’s one:

“A singer in a smokey room
A smell of wine and cheap perfume
For a smile they can share the night
It goes on and on and on and on” -Journey