I have been at Microsoft for 5 years

Oh wow! Things have been so busy I almost forgot!

I have now been at Microsoft for 5 years!

Let’s take a quick stroll down memory lane, shall we?

1999
October: I interviewed at Hopkins on-campus for a job with Microsoft.
The most interesting question? "You just shipped a product. Your team is
incredibly exhausted. A magazine reviewer calls to tell your that an advanced
copy of your product randomly crashes. What do you do?" A few weeks later I get an invitation to interview in California for Mac products

November 24-28th: I was home in NY from college for Thanksgiving Break.

November 28-29th: I was back in college to submit a project that I had completed.

November 30th: I went back to NY and interviewed with
Lehman Brothers. That night I would stay at the
Marriott World Trade Center.

I still have the card key from that hotel…

December 1st: I flew out to San Jose and arrive at SJC. Being that I took Continental, I arrived at Terminal C. You can imagine my bemusement at having deplane using a staircase to the tarmac in Silicon Valley. I stayed at
The Fairmont San Jose and had
dinner by myself at Gordon Biersch.
Later that night I would study the notes I had taken on Outlook Express for Mac
- the product that I thought I would be interviewing for.

December 2nd: I went out to the non descript building where Microsoft’s Mac
Internet Products Unit was then located on
Tasman in San
Jose. That day I interviewed with the recruiter,
Omar, Brad,
Dave
(who took me to lunch at Marie Calendars),
Dan, and Jud. I then was schlepped over
to Cupertino to interview with Brendan at the PowerPoint building. And then I
met Jimmy who took me out to the
interview dinner at Fontana’s
(pretty good place) and to show me the under-construction

Microsoft campus in Mountain View. These were some truly awesome people that
I met, and I really really really wanted to work there! (Oh yeah, I was wearing
a suit the whole time and these same awesome people made fun of that after I got
hired.)

December 3rd: I get back to Baltimore but my luggage doesn’t because it gets
lost in Denver’s baggage system.

December 6th: The recruiter calls me to let me know that I am offered a job!
Hurray! Of course, I accept!

2000
January 1st: The world came to an end. Oh wait. It didn’t. Stupid millennium
bug fears! (Remember Y2K?)

January 3-9th: I went to MacWorld SF for the first time,
courtesy of Microsoft. When I got to Moscone to get a badge, the show operators
said I wasn’t on the list. So I told them that I was with Microsoft - with no
proof. They simply gave me a badge - sweet! This was also the MacWorld where
Steve showed off OS X and Aqua.

May 25th: I graduate from Hopkins. Hurray!

June 14th: I flew out to San Jose - leaving NY for good. On that
day, it was 60 degrees when I left JFK so I was wearing a sweater.
Unfortunately, when I got to San Jose, it was a

record breaking 109 degrees that day. And I had 3 giant suitcases to lug
around the scorching hot car rental lot. I think I almost passed out!

June 19th: Less than a month after I graduated, I started my
career at Microsoft.

Since then…
Wow, a lot has happened since then. Here are some of the products that I
helped ship:

• Office 2001

• Office X, and its various service packs.

• Handheld Sync for Entourage X

• MSN Explorer for Mac

• Office 2004, and its service packs.

• PST Import Tool for Entourage 2004

• Some Entourage-related stuff the MacBU will release later
  this year

And today, I work on MSN Search
Toolbar with Windows Desktop Search. (Or, MSNSTBwWDS for short.)

In the 5 years at Microsoft, I’ve learned so much - there are so
many smart (scary smart) people here that it truly is like drinking out of a
firehose. I’ve met so many great people - some of them in real life too (instead
of only on email)! The ability that I have been provided to date to make a
difference has been astounding. And, courtesy of the MacBU, I accrued so many
miles on American Airlines visiting customers - great times.

So much has happened in the last 5 years - I can’t wait to see
what’s coming up next.

Who says Microsoft can’t ship great things? You just need to
know where to look!

Thinking of working at MSN? Leave me a comment and I’ll get back
to you on it! MSN is hiring!