Yep, that is right indeed, I have one of such babies. Privileges of being a Microsoft Student Partner huh? It does have its downturns as well though, such as when I go out of my house, there's a massive crowd waiting to get my autograph and to interview me... (not really...)

But that's just it, just wanted to share my shiny new subscriptor card with you readers and have you envy it. Yes, now I have Vista Ultimate for free, and who knows, maybe Windows 7 too, when it gets out...

My apologies for having gone through a period without posting at all but, my life has been undergoing some maintenance (all for good, I assure you! but won't get into specifics) and therefore I haven't been coming here as often as I would like. This is however going to change and so, expect to see more regular posting from now on.

See you soon!

This Microsoft event is taking place on October 3rd, on Lisbon at the Centro Cultural de Belém, and guess what? That's right, I will be there thanks to being an MSP I get to attend the event without having to pay a dime. Neat huh? Can barely wait to see Monke.... I mean, Steve Ballmer on stage with all his energy .

Here's the schedule I picked:

8h30 - Welcome Coffee
9h15 - Dev01 - Software development: The current status and future trends of technological development
10h15 - Coffee Break
10h45 - Dev02 - Creating rich applications using Silverlight 2.0 (2 sessions)
12h45 - Lunch
14h40 - Keynote
Dreamway: Microsoft today and tomorrow, Steve Ballmer
IE8: pushing the web forward, Miguel Caldas
16h00 - ITP04 - SQL Server 2008 as an enterprise grade database platform - How to manage and provide robust, reliable, scalable and innovative solutions
17h00 - Coffee Break
17h30 - Dev09 - Windows Presentation Foundation: How can we take advantage of this technology to improve the user experience

So, yeah, it's my first event of the kind and I'm hoping it will be a great experience to learn I'll keep you readers posted on how it goes.

First off, my apologies for having gone for so long without posting anything, but the truth is that I have been too busy to think about my blog. I have had my vacations on Lagos and right after that, I went to the far North of Portugal with the rest of the Portuguese Microsoft Student Partners.

It was a great experience, an amazing chance to learn from people who have been in our shoes at some point and have thrived brilliantly, and also a fabulous opportunity to get to know the other MSPs and to make new friends. All of this was certainly achieved. I met some really great people, some really smart and brilliant guys and the scenery was absolutely amazing. I know some people prefer beaches and all sunny weather and that stuff, me I enjoy mountains, cool breezes and deep, green valleys so the place was perfectly picked, except that it was oddly warm for this time of the year, but oh well... you can't understand weather these days anymore.

The funniest/weirdest experience was definitely showering to the light of a flashlight. Right as we were getting ready to leave, a massive thunderstorm fell upon the place with lots of raining, and all I remember was hearing a big *KABOOM* and all of a sudden I was in a completely dark bathroom. One of my mates (Nuno Sousa) kindly borrowed me his flashlight and that's how I had to finish my shower.

All in all and everything considered, it was a wonderful weekend and well worth the effort of spending 6 hours in a train .

Me Giving The Keynote Speech

(Not really the keynote that is just me receiving the MSP card and presenting myself)

Here I am again, this time writing about my first experience as a Microsoft Student Partner, or at least as an MSP-to-be .

This wasn't exactly planned, instead it was Rodrigo's idea to invite me to come along. Rodrigo is the current MSP at ESTG Leiria and for the next year, I will be "taking his place", hence the invitation with the purpose of getting me into the spirit of the thing.

The plan was to visit a children nursing house in Leiria. Basically it's a house where children are sent to when they either have lost their parents or when their parents simply can't support them in a good environment. So we were to visit the said house and offer them a brand new XBOX with 2 games. We did so and everyone was happy, we were happy for having done the good deed of the day, the kids were happy because they had been given a new toy.

After some conversation regarding some basic courses we will also be providing the children with, we all came back home. Not much was settled regarding these courses, since the holidays are ending and the whole school fuss is starting to spin again, so there aren't many certainties regarding schedules yet, but this will be the plan for the upcoming months: arrange for the children to be taught basic notions on Windows and Word.

I'll keep the news coming as I have them.

I'm also posting a password-protected post with the pictures from this event, just to make sure that only allowed people get to see them, as I'm not the only one in them.

Well, I could not have better news today: I was accepted into Microsoft's Student Partner Program! Out of the initial 30 students who had been called for an interview in Lisbon, 20 of us got picked and I am amongst those 20.

The thrill starts right away in September, month on which we were asked to not make any plans for either the first nor the last weekend. I'm still a little bit on the dark, regarding what's happening and where but we were promised more news soon, so I can but to wait to hear more from the people in charge. I'll post here when I know more.