After five long years, we had the Windows Vista ship party yesterday. It was in the parking garage under Building 27, which sounds like an odd venue, but there aren't many places at Microsoft that can hold so many people on a rainy afternoon. It was good fun to see everyone there; I'm surprised how many people I know from other teams. I was also surprised to see how emotional I was during Jim Allchin's talk as well as BillG's talk. (Jim in the outgoing President of the Windows division and the guy most associated with Vista). Everyone I talked to was happy, relieved, and strangely, a bit lost. We've all been so focused on Vista for so long, that it's odd to not have it ahead of us anymore.

Anyway, the party was fun. There was a mainstage band, a dueling piano bar, a red carpet/limonsene entrance to make everyone coming in feel special (complete with camera crew and velvet rope line entrace), billiards, fake tattoos, a dress-up photo booth (there's a funny one of me with my friends), and of course, food and drinks. We also all signed a few big Vista DVD replicas for the history books. I'm proud to have been part of it.

Some photos: