[DISCLAIMER: the opinions posted here do not necessarily represent those of my employer.]

To great relief, I am now back in the Northeast after a trip to AWS re:Invent 2022.  For the benefit of no one in particular I am now journaling my thoughts, in no particular order.

My biggest observation is, quite simply, to hell with Las Vegas.  It's not the place for me.  Very overstimulating.  Everyone and everything wants your attention, and there is almost no escape from it.  I can only imagine what my introvert daughter would do if she were there ... she'd probably curl into a ball with a blanket over herself and noise-canceling headphones on for the entire time.  There are not just lights, but jumbotrons everywhere.  On the sides of buildings, on the backs of trucks, there are flashing lights everywhere everywhere everywhere.  There is no keeping to yourself in Las Vegas; everyone and everything is in your face.

Amazon wasted a lot of space.  Their convention took up space in half a dozen different hotels.  And these aren't just ordinary hotels; each one of them is a mini city with a large convention center, a casino, an entire shopping mall, and thousands of rooms.  I believe they wasted a lot of space and they could have done the convention in maybe one or two of these hotels.  And they didn't have to spread it out all over the strip either.  How about using hotels that are all next to each other so you don't need buses to get between them!  Including the beautiful and fabulous Trump hotel, which they passed on because Amazon is full of the kind of people who work for Amazon.

How about the food?  The food in Las Vegas is overpriced.  It's good, but I'm from New York so I'm no stranger to good food.  It's just "good".  Not out-of-this-world.  But the food inside the convention?  Practically inedible.  Once again, it was put together by the kind of people who would work for Amazon.  Nearly all of it gluten-free, dairy-free, and taste-free.  Even the "ethnic" food was lousy: a man of Indian origin who sat at a table with me said "I have eaten a lot of curry, and this is not good curry."  Hey Amazon, how about you just put out a table full of hot dogs?  It's the easiest food in the world to serve to tens of thousands of people.  In the world of food, wide appeal is diametrically opposed to politically correct food fads.  After about the second day our team didn't even bother with the grub hall and we just went out for lunch.  Maybe they're counting on that.  (If I go back next year I'll probably hack the system by requesting a kosher meal.  Those looked edible.)

To be honest ... I really think that Amazon simply doesn't care.  They're the biggest name in technology right now and this whole convention is just a way for them to flaunt their bigness.  There's no pan-industry conference like COMDEX anymore, so "anyone who's anyone" simply shows up at re:Invent, sometimes with only a barely viable token connection to cloud computing.  And that's probably what Amazon is thinking: "bring the whole industry to here because we are the industry."  And for the time being, that is true, since "cloud" is the current mania.

(For the truth about cloud mania, read David Hansson's excellent blog post "Why We're Leaving The Cloud [https://world.hey.com/dhh/why-we-re-leaving-the-cloud-654b47e0]" in which he correctly points out the places where hyperscale cloud computing excels -- at the small end of the market where a new organization can't afford infrastructure, and at the high end where massive elasticity is needed -- and that the stable, predictable middle is better served by other hosting setups.)

As mentioned in the disclaimer, my opinions do not necessarily represent those of my employer.  As an IT architecture professional I work in both public and private cloud spaces.  As a technolibertarian I want a level playing field, and my opinion is that both Amazon and its conference are too damn big.  The only relief I found was at a Denny's across the street from my mega-hotel, where I sat, late in the evening, in a room that was not overcrowded, without flashing lights in my face, without loud noise everywhere, sipping some good coffee and finding my zen.  In that moment, I found a peaceful space that mimicked home, until I could finally get home.

DANGER!! WARNING!! NEW WORLD ORDER HAS SPY DEVICES IN HOMES AROUND THE WORLD!!!

We have learned this shocking new secret about the shadowy cabal of globalists who secretly control all of the power and wealth in the world. While their media outlets try to distract you by having their controlled opposition point you to the World Economic Forum, their Hitler-equivalent criminals such as George Soros and Bill Gates are still conducting all of their real business at the 

annual Bilderberg meeting. But you already knew that because you are smart!

What you didn’t know will shock you … perhaps literally!

As it so happens, the relationship between “Bilderburg” and “Build-A-Bear” is NOT COINCIDENTAL.They are literally one and the same organization!

The same evil scientists who created the bioweapon called “the covid-19 vaccine” -- and, eventually, a virus that it supposedly fights – have also deployed millions of these “stuffed animals” which contain devices that track all human activity within the immediate area. When your child “kisses the heart” of the toy before inserting it into its delivery system, he or she leaves a DNA imprint which is used by the Bilderbergs to associate data collection with a specific family.

This data is merged with other tracking data collected by Facebook, Alexa, and other eavesdropping systems into a massive database maintained by the New World Order. What is most frightening, however, is that each device also contains a massive explosive charge which can be detonated remotely if specific citizens need to be silenced quickly.

This is why it is extremely important to continue wearing your tinfoil hat when you are indoors, even in your own home. As an alternative, you can wrap the bear in tinfoil, as this will also suppress The Signal.

The people who now operate Disney Corporation are a bunch of pedophile communists who ought to be vaporized by Zombie Walt Disney after he sees what horrible things they've done with the company that bears his name. But that's not what I'm writing about today.

Consider the following musical passage - the first three bars of "Into the Unknown" written by Kristen and Robert Lopez for "Frozen 2":

This passage is sung twice by Idina Menzel as "aah-aaaah, aah-aaaah" before her lyrical performance begins. The accompaniment is built around a C-minor chord, the key in which the piece is written.

Now consider the following musical passage, written by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant and found at approximately 6:25 into Led Zeppelin's magnum opus "Stairway to Heaven":

This passage is repeated four times, coming out of an epic guitar solo and entering into the final vocal section of the piece. "Stairway" is written in A-minor, but the transposition to C-minor and a meaningless time signature change (overall, the note values do not change, at least in this passage) does not obfuscate its obvious origin.

It is clear that Lopez and Lopez blatantly stole this passage from Page and Plant. But that is what the post-Walt version of Disney does: they appropriate the work of others and masquerade it as their own.

But I suppose turnabout is fair play, since Led Zeppelin's entire act is a ripoff of Deep Purple.

"This thing keeps attacking me"

In our house, this phrase means "I opened the door to the [refrigerator | cupboard | etc] and an item fell out and landed on me.  This has happened before.  I will now pick up the item and carelessly replace it in a manner that it will probably happen again."

"Four more sleeps until we go on vacation!"

It's something we say to children, to make it easier to grasp the span of time between now and some upcoming event.  But as an engineer I like it for adults too!  Because it's non-ambiguous.  We don't have to worry about days vs. nights, about whether you're including the first and/or last day of the count, or anything like that.  I'm writing this on a Wednesday, and after four sleeps it will be Sunday.  It only falls apart when you're talking to someone who sleeps multiple times per 24-hour period, which is a problem because I'm currently trying to explain to my daughter's cat how long it will be before she comes home from the trip she's on.

Honorable mention goes to the 1987 musical "Into The Woods" where they counted "midnights".  (And by the way -- Bernadette Peters was awesome as the Witch, and Meryl Streep completely blew the role, because she's a horrible person who sucks at everything).  One midnight gone!  Two midnights gone!  It's the laaaaaaaaaaaaaaast midnight...     So that's a nice computer-compatible way to do it -- count the number of times the date changes.   :)

Now if someone could figure out that cat problem, I'd appreciate it.