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Ok so it’s all my fault!

When setting our wedding date Ashley and I didn’t check the conference calendar and so didn’t spot that Search Engine Strategies San Jose falls this year from 10th to the 14th August!

What were we thinking?!

It was only after paying the deposit on the caterers and the DJ, after friends had booked their exorbitant and non-refundable air fares from London, and after securing a super deal on an All American Mobile BBQ that we realised our gargantuan error.

Our wedding date is set for 15th August and as much as I tried to shoehorn a trip to California into our pre-wedding itinerary, herself was having none of it!

I tried to explain that SearchBash is a very sober affair and that I would make a Wednesday morning flight back to Seattle but to no avail………

It seems some things must take precedence over one of the happiest conferences of our lives.

I sincerely hope that you enjoy the week, that Mike Grehan & Kevin Ryan behave themselves 🙂 and that the keynote speeches are much better than my best men’s are going to be!

Do say hi to all my Microsoft colleagues who’ll be there in force, and get a 20% discount by checking out this post on Microsoft Advertising Community!

P.S. Can you believe she won’t let me TwitPic her coming down the aisle?!!!

You’ve read the reviews and watched the videos, now you have a chance to pre-order a copy of Windows 7 from £49.99 at the Microsoft Store from midnight tonight!

Remember if you are replacing an older version of Windows with Windows 7 once it arrives on 22 October, a clean install of the operating system and the installation of an internet browser will be required.

Check out http://www.microsoft.com/windows for more info!

Amazed that rail ticket machines in this country don’t have QWERTY layouts for typing in required information.

Might sound silly, but the brain takes a while to engage with the above letter formation when trying to buy a ticket.

Add up thousands of people having similar difficulties and you have 1000s of minutes wasted and I bet a lot of lost revenue and missed trains.

I like this approach. Waitrose has always been seen as a more up-market brand of supermarket and some would say more expensive.

So in a recession when you’re trying to attract people that are saving their pennies, why not just stick your products and prices up on a bill board?

People are looking for value for money and this advertising of their “essential range” demonstrates that they’re not all the expensive after all!

Watch Michael Jackson’s Memorial today at 10am PST in Silverlight!!

Office Live Workspace is FREE! 😉

Got to be a career highlight! 🙂

Well less than 24 hours after entertaining and being entertained by Will Carling post the Microsoft Search Summit – more on that at a later date – I’m in The Palais Stephanie in Cannes having had another of the maddest 24 hours of my career!

First impressions are that this festival is full on. There are people from all over the world here to learn, be wowed and experience some of the most cutting edge advertising on the planet- a lot of which is now digital!

We arrived last night and sped to Marco Polo’s a restaurant on the beach, a bit beyond the town, for a very cool and laid back dinner with the whole Microsoft Advertising Team that’s out here.

The up bright and early meeting the film crew that will help us interview a raft of folks from Microsoft execs to people on the street finding out what their expectations are of Cannes and what they’re looking forward to from the week.

Our cyber lounge at the conference centre is pretty cool! Lots of PCs and internet access and this Microsoft Surface table I spotted with two South Americans firmly ensconced next to with their Apple Macs wide open!

They look happy don’t they!

Jenny and I have started filming with the Media Brands crew and I think we’ve found our presenting feet…..well time will tell!

That’s me with the “I’m an FB” Tee Shirt on!

Now I’m off to the land of nod to dream up some questions to ask Biz Stone!

Check out more photos at Cannes Lions Microsoft Advertising Community and Microsoft Advertising on Facebook.

For all you UK (and French or Canadian) advertisers that wanted local data in the (previously known as the Add-In for Excel) Microsoft Advertising Intelligence Tool, you know can!

Check out what Carolyn’s been saying on the Microsoft Advertising Blog and take a look at this site specific to the UK!

What do you think? What else would you like to see added?