So I attended the PHPNW15 conference this weekend and what a weekend. I’ve been an attendee of the conference for a number of years and have always enjoyed it immensely. However this year turned out to be something special.

Following on from my first ever appearance as the PHP Boy Scout I decided to submit to the Unconference at PHPNW15.

It was a good talk, an extension of the previous lightening talk I’d given and felt really good to give. Unbeknownst to me however there was mischief afoot. Normally the Unconference talks are rated by the organisers and the one that they selected as the best gets to have a guaranteed slot in next years PHPNW conference. All of which I had genuinely either no idea about or had forgotten had happened in previous conferences,

As you may have guessed from the fact this post exists, I ended up winning that slot.

However…. it appeared that a Speaker had taken ill at the last minute and couldn’t make it at which point I was asked a mere 3 minutes before it was announce that I was also going to be given the hangover slot on track three for the Sunday sessions!!!!!

Suffice to say I had an interesting evening to say the least, in preparing my talk for “the big time”

Amazingly I felt really calm about everything, and even had a good chuckle about managing to find some props to help break the ice!

Everything is ready, I’ve practiced, knowing my talk was going to be a bit short… but that was ok considering the short notice, and I had plenty of anecdotes I could use as filler. I’m sat there waiting for the moment I have to put my head above the parapet and all of a sudden……..

nothing

My mind goes blank!

The long and the short is that I survived, and the feedback I have had has been amazing and I’ll be taking all of it on board to make sure that next time its even better!

The recordings should be available in the near future so when they are I will share a link so you can judge how it went for yourselves. In the mean time I’ve published the revised slide deck for you on slideshare.net/phpboyscout/are-you-a-good-scout-phpnw15-track-3

I’m hoping that I can now find some opportunities to practice for my slot at #phpnw16

[slideshare id=53508432&doc=areyouagoodscout-151004073451-lva1-app6892]