Session Kanban cards at XP Days Benelux 2009

I have attended a fair share of (scientific) conferences, and in my experience, the interesting things always happen in the coffee breaks, or in the poster sessions. Lectures are somewhat stiff, usually scientists talk about work they’ve already published, and it is very rare to hear any truly new insights. Finally, questions after the session are often pro-forma, and rarely lead into deep discussions due to lack of time. Don’t misunderstand me – conferences are important places to meet, but the official program often isn’t too captivating. Go into a lecture hall and watch from the back what all these people with laptops are doing – working, skyping, coding, writing email… but I am getting off track, I think.

At XP Days Benelux, this was all different. People come to share and to interact. From the start with an icebreaker session each morning (and I was still thinking “oh no! psycho-touchy-feely stuff!”…), people started networking, and I have met a lot of interesting people and have had interesting conversations with many, inside sessions and in the coffee breaks. It was a very enjoyable experiences, rounded off with the games night in the bar, where werewolves and belgian beer were the driving forces.

Xavier Quesada and Laurent Morisseau held a session on Visual Management for Agile Teams. Here, we built scrum task boards in groups and discussed the many different ways you can actually do that and what it means for the team and the managers.
The Retrospective Hero session by Nicole Belilos and Willem van den Ende used a role-play simulation that challenged two coaches (and they did warn the audience – don’t be a coach unless you’re experienced) to manage a crisis and lead the team through learning lessons from it. It was scary how well people slid into their roles! One big lesson: In a crisis, try to let the team voice their emotions first, as they will come out anyhow. But (a big but!) do it without going too much into the touchy feely direction.

The action continued into the night with a BoF by Pierluigi Pugliese on his solution focused approach to agile coaching. Another BoF was run by Serge Beaumont on practical tools, like the Ready state and Jeff Patton’s Story Mapping for the Product Owner. Both BoFs have noticeably created a lot of buzz in the community and it seems clear that Pierluigi and Serge have hit a nerve with what they presented. Moreover, I think that there are a number of points that connect the two talks.

In the Solve Conflicts Without Compromise session, which was run by Pascal Van Cauwenberghe and Jef Cumps, the session leaders tried to introduce a model that allows you to (I am simplifying here) figure out in 6 steps that two conflicting goals can – at least very often – be lifted onto a higher level, where all of a sudden their underlying goals are compatible, and it is just a question of carefully assessing all the assumptions that were made concerning the goals. An interesting approach, but at least in the session, none of the (real life) conflicts were really resolved. Then again, solving conflicts in 90′ is a big feat to aim for, if you are doing it for the first time, even more so.

Eating your own dogfood: Using Agile methods to set up conference desk

Finally, Portia Tung introduced us to the retelling of the Wizard of Oz fairytale, and how you can use the yellow brick road as a path in peer coaching. I found this session amazing, since we were in turn describing our problems, coaching others in addressing their problem, or observing the coach-coachee interaction.

But, as I said in the opening paragraphs, the sessions are excellent but aren’t really what makes this gathering great. It is the very open spirit, a genius loci (there really isn’t much more to do around the conference center either), which makes the participants try to learn from each other rather than try to get the daily office work done on their laptop during the sessions. Oops, there I am back with my initial rant – so I better stop right

Good idea… I’ll show you mine, will you show me yours?

(not yet prioritized, except that I’m reading the top one right now)

PS: What a pity that the next decent bookstore is in Bern. Or Portland, but that’s hardly around the corner.

Even if time has become a valued commodity lately, I still like to cook, and to occasionally try out new things. On this long weekend, I ventured to explore a heavenly taste combination: Basil and Strawberries. I remembered this combination from idly thumbing through Culinary Artistry, an extraordinary and inspiring book by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page. Follow me below the fold for the recipe!

Basil Ice Cream

~40g fresh basil leaves
6 egg yolks
500ml regular milk
100ml cream (Vollrahm – wenn schon, denn schon)
120g white sugar
1 pinch freshly ground black pepper

Pick leaves from basil, wash and dry carefully. Chop coarsely, and reserve 1/4th of the chopped basil. Bring milk and cream to a boil. While cooling down, add 3/4 of the chopped basil to milk, let infuse.After 5-10 minutes, pass through sieve to remove basil.

In a pot, beat egg yolks and sugar until white and foamy. Slowly add handwarm milk to mix. Heat mixture up while stirring until it reaches 85°C and coagulates. Keep stirring for 5 more minutes. Cool down in bain marie with ice water. Add reserved chopped basil and a pinch or two of black pepper and keep in fridge over night.

The following day, spread in large plastic freezing dish. Mix thoroughly every hour while freezing. Alternatively, use ice cream maker and save yourself all the trouble

Meringue

Since the ice cream leaves us with plenty of egg whites, here’s a quick way to do something nice with them:

6 egg whites (clean, no egg yolk contamination)
375g white sugar
2.5 tsp vanilla extract

Beat egg whites several minutes until very stiff, gradually adding half of the sugar. Using a spatula, carefully add the rest of the sugar, as well as the vanilla extract. The consistency should be “blancs d’oeuf au bec d’oiseau”, that is, the egg white should form a little beak-shaped droplet if you put your finger into it.

Put baking paper onto two baking trays and use an icing bag (or an improvised one) to make 8cm long meringues. I could make about 50 of them with the above quantities. Cook for 50′ at 120°C in the oven. Let cool down gently by switching off oven and keeping door slightly open over night.

Plating suggestions:

Quarter two ripe strawberries and place. Decorate with balsamic reduction (goes well with Basil, goes well with Strawberries), a single scoop of the ice cream and a meringue. For good looks, I browned the meringue for 1 second with a blowtorch.

Bon appétit!

… Damian Pascal!
06.04.2009 09:27
3600g 50cm 36.6 deg. Celsius

The proud parents
Carmela & Michael

Another UPDATE: More pictures are now at a new location: here

Ich war schon bereit, mich zu fügen, und diese “volle Wumme” gegen die Deutsche Sprache verständnisvoll als etwas forcierte Kreativität zu klassifizieren, da machte mich mein Wochenend-Besuch in der französischsprachigen Schweiz etwas stutzig:

Voilà ! Perfektes Französisch … auf Anhieb! Und wo ist jetzt der Charme?

Auch wenn ich glaube zu wissen, was die nette Dame mir mitteilen will, verstehen tu ich’s nicht. Oder ist das etwa so eine ähnliche absichtliche Sprachvergewaltigung wie einstmals “Deutschlands meiste Kreditkarte”?

This Saturday, we first wanted to go out after dinner, for a drink or so. But then, we ended up on our balcony, with lots of candles & a good bottle of wine, which was great! Maybe I’m getting old and comfortable?

Really. Your safety is our number one concern. Therefore, may we ask you for your own safety and that of your fellow travelers to only take one drink at a time? And for your own comfort to clean up your mess after use? And while you’re at it, please fill out this self check-in form, so that we don’t have to do it. For your own comfort, of course…

These kind of requests are everywhere today in the US. I really don’t mind if I’m asked for a little cooperation, or to make everybody’s job a little easier by just, well, behaving like any well-behaving person would do. No problem with that at all. But please – don’t try to make me believe that it’s for my safety to only use one toilet seat cover at a time, or to throw away empty paper cups. It’s not. Not for my safety, not for my comfort. It’s just common sense. Tell ‘em that next time, instead.

Another feature of the pacific northwest are the microbreweries. As I was told, this trend really took off in Portland, but it’s everywhere up here now. If you want a sampling, go to Henry’s 12th Street Tavern in Portland. They have exactly 100 beers on tap – and I counted them. Small isn’t always beautiful, however. I have tasted many of the microbreweries around here, and occasionally, I would actually prefer some standard Miller or Budweiser to their product:

The above was advertised as an IPA, but it was foamless and turbid like a 2-day-old wheat beer. And that’s what it tasted like. Maybe it was two days old, after all.

The picture below is for Albert the office mascot. Thousands of puffins and other marine birds nest on the rocks around where Tillamook lighthouse stands. Even though there’s abundance, they’re not found on the menu, perhaps the local chefs are lacking the right recipe?

Even though the weather hasn’t really been very cooperative, it is a ray of light in our busy schedules. Time to relax and look out on the ocean. Or to sit in the hotel lobby, writing blog posts while it pours outside. Every now and then, the rain subsides, and we even managed to take some nice shots of the surrounding scenery, for instance in Ecola State Park: