Off to Canada…

I’m staying with ‘ma and pa’ tonight in preparation for my trip to speak at the CHI2006 Conference in Montreal, Canada (they live closer to the airport than the Metcalfe Pad). I’m off tomorrrow (well this morning now), Monday.

I’m co-speaking with Bret Taylor from Google Maps about mash-ups. Our presentation “Add a dash of interface: Taking mash-ups to the next level” will introduce the subject and focus on what the design/interface community can do to get involved.

I’ll also be making a special announcement which will be blogged here too.

Despite my Canadian roots, it’s actually the first time I will have been to Canada since my grandfather’s funeral some 10 years ago. I’m not really in contact with any of the my wider family who live in Canada, and so there has been little reason to go back since.

I’m definitely feeling some ambivalence towards my trip. On the one hand I love visiting new cities – I’ve never been to “French Canada” let alone Montreal.

However, I’m thinking about my late grand-parents and also not having Sofia with me to share the experiences of travel.

Although I’m used to speaking at conferences, I guess I’m also mindful about the task in hand – delivering a confident speech, product launch and ‘on-message’ discussion panel in front of 1800+ people (which is quite a big crowd).

And don’t even get me started about the backchannel… 🙂

I’m also pissed off that my flight is via Amsterdam (1hr 20mins in the wrong direction to fly back again, urgh!).

Finally, Monday the 24th April also sees a decision about an important foundation-element of the “Ben Metcalfe: World Domination Plan”. It’s a decision that’s out of my hands but one that I’ll be relieved to get out of the way (asuming it’s the outcome I’m hoping for). I’m sorry it’s all a bit cryptic but as you know things are afoot at the moment. It’ll be in the timeline of events…

Footnote

As always my Virgin Mobile telephone doesn’t work abroad because Virgin keep cocking up int’ roaming on my mobile account – perhaps a blessing in disguise when you look at the roaming charges!

However if you want to get in touch with me you can call my shiny new VoIP number:

UK: (020) 7871 4010
Worldwide: +44 20 7871 4010

Or better still, Skype me:

Skype: dotBen