1^st off, go and read Vlad and Susanne's blog entries.

Is this a so long and thanks for all the fish post?  Have I been lying to you all this time and I don't really care about the community or the partners that toil in this part of the business?

No, or at least not to it all, but my life has new perspectives now and this will have an impact.

Lets' look at what happened - I went to the Worldwide Partner Conference and helped present at a couple of mobility sessions and attended the 1^st ever Small Business Symposium - 600 people attending to work out about partnering with Microsoft in the small biz marketplace.  It was a storm.  I also went to a few parties and very, very much enjoyed myself.  Those of you who know me well know I don't drink much as I am nearly always driving - well not in Boston, so the drink was certainly flowing too.  It got me thinking - what was my end goal in life?  "To Live to Work, or Work to Live?"  I have a new baby (http://uksbsguy.com/lizzy), a family and need my own life and they were not getting the attention they need.  Thinking about all this just completed the world spinning effect I felt last week.  I spoke to several important and close friends and after wallowing for a week, I am now in fix mode.

I did considered leaping off the world right there, finding a new job in the US as it was hot, sunny and without many worries (we called it staying in "LA LA" land), but that would have left the rest of my life in tatters and actually did not help me with what I wanted - it was just a nice place with nice people.  So I have worked hard to put things back together, but I have decided that I can't spend the time I currently do with technology - so some would say "no more mister nice guy" as there will be less "let me just fix that for you" things I will do."

I've also decided to scratch a couple of the other itches I have had, which means that I am off to get qualified as crew and then skipper for my small sailing bug, maybe do a few reckless sports, tidy myself up a bit and then emerge like a beautiful butterfly from the cocoon (ok, so I am not actually having plastic surgery).  And I want to try and do all this while spending more time with my family, so just to re-iterate - loading Vista until 2am, fixing unusual SBS problems or travelling round the country every evening sort of become a bit of a no-no.

I'm still going to be blogging and voicing my unofficial & occasionally official opinion on things small business, but there might be a little less activity as things change.

So, why might you ask, am I telling you all about this?  We all have moments of self doubt - asking "what is right", "why am I here" and "perhaps life would just be easier if I got off?"  I learnt (again) that avoiding life is not an option - if you need change, then work out what you want to do and change for the better - correct the course of your boat, don't jump overboard.  It is not always easy, especially if you have to trim something that is close to your heart, but believing in what you do 24hrs a day is worth trying to achieve.

Ttfn and good luck yourselves

David