In the first week of November I was privileged to attend the MVP Summit at Microsoft in Redmond. I think it was the best Summit I have been to, with much more open interchange with the Excel team about things that might or might not make it into Excel one day.
Anyway I can’t tell you anything more about that, but I can say that all the Excel MVPs are a really nice bunch of people, who like to sit around in Rock Bottom, drink beer and talk Excel geek stuff (which I also like to do to!). Here are some photos of my fellow MVP geeks (you will have met many of these on various Excel forums):
From left to right: Jon Peltier, Roger Govier, Kevin “Zorvek” Jones, Brad Yundt, Jon Acampora, Mynda Treacy
Jan-Karel Pieterse pours the beer (of course he never drinks any himself!) for new Excel team member Joe McDaid
UK MVP Lead Claire (what does this button do?)
Mynda Treacy and Jon Peltier ham it up for the camera with Ingeborg “Teylyn” Hawighorst in the background.
Zack “Tables go this way” Barresse (aka FireFytr), Chris “Smitty” Smith and Frédéric (if its not Power Query I’m bored) Le Guen
Ron (Wrong Bus) Coderre, Wim Gielis, Mandy Govier
Excel beer (courtesy of Frederic)
And now for this year’s mystery photos:
Mystery Photo 1: Where is this?
Mystery Photo 2: What does this have to do with Excel?
Excel and UDF Performance Stuff 
Mystery Photo 2: because it’s an agave!
Correct (Agave was the internal name for Apps for Office): I took the photo in the Botanical Gardens at Delft whilst I was there for EUSPRIG.
Mystery photo 1: Rock Bottom
Mystery photo 2: Excel is cactus without VBA!
Mynda,
1) Correct
2) Nice try …
Thanks for posting the photos Charles. It’s been a few years since I’ve been to the summit so it’s nice to see my old friends in pictures if not in person.
Dick, I hope it gives you an incentive to go to the next Summit!