I’m at RailsConf2007, and while it “officially” starts tomorrow, I’ve already had a good ’nuff time that it’s been worth the effort to get here… nevermind that there are three more days of Geekfestness and that I’ll be seeing four of my favorite human beings early next week.

Lou Springer posted some pictures on his blog of the Flex on Rails “Birds of a Feather” “session,” and I’m in one of ‘em with my hand in my groin. Perhaps that summarizes how awesome Peter Armstrong’s presentation was… though it was entirely too short (the presentation, that is…).

I couldn’t agree more with Lou’s comment:

The one-hour BOF presentation went through the Flex and Rails story at a blinding clip. It’s too bad there wasn’t a full session on the subject at the conference.

About six months ago, when I finally checked out Flex, I stumbled across Peter’s book and tried to oder it on Lulu. I had some problems with Lulu’s login process (some sort of session management problem which made me nervous about giving them my credit card info.) so I wrote to him to ask if he’d be willing to sell me a copy directly. After politely responding to a couple of my cranky e-mails, he sent me a copy of the book and suggested that I make a donation to Child’s Play if I wanted to compensate him (he’s an above-board kinda guy and didn’t want to skirt paying taxes on it). I was really, really impressed at the time and after meeting him, I’m even more impressed.

Flex + Rails is some powerful Kool-Aid and Peter’s book “Flexible Rails” is beyond worth the $20 he undercharges for it. Hopefully Peter will get more attention/space/time at the next conference. Take a look at the pictures Lou took… the room we were in was sitting room only. There’s definitely a lot of interest in Flex + Rails integration, and I’m sure it’ll do nothing but grow. I think Peter is a good face/brain to represent this segment of the Railsiverse, and hopefully he’ll gain the attention he deserves in the Rails and Flex communities.

Like Lou, I got a t-shirt which doesn’t quite fit, but I’ll give it to a cute girl and take pictures of her wearin’ it. That’s better marketing (and easier on the eyes, I’m sure) than me wearin’ it, hands down.

I’ve been surprised to run across a number of Ruby on Rails folks who I recognize from the Bay Area. It kinda figures that they’d be here… but it’s just cool to be far from home and see familiar faces. I’m impressed with how cool and genuinely nice so many folks in the Rails community are. I feel like I’m making some new friends that I’ll have for a long time. I certainly hope that’s the case.

I should probably do some name dropping and link-lovin’, but the bed I’m sitting near looks awfully comfortable right now. Besides, a number of the folks I’m meeting will likely end up in my list o’ friends over there in the sidebar… and there are several days of Geek Joy remaining.