Today is April Fool's Day—the day when many of us celebrate just how gullible we really are. Celebrants enjoy the day by spoofing co-workers and engaging in fun hoaxes and practical jokes.

Over the years, I've personally been the target of many an April Fool's prank. Considering today's date, I'm not sure what to make of the following email that I received this morning. Am I the target of yet another joke?

Congratulations! We are pleased to present you with the 2008 Microsoft® MVP Award! The MVP Award is our way to say thank you for promoting the spirit of community and improving people’s lives and the industry’s success every day. We appreciate your extraordinary efforts in Visual C# technical communities during the past year.

I suppose it's possible that Microsoft has a thoroughly sick sense of humor, and this is just an elaborate hoax. On the other hand, it could be that Microsoft has absolutely no sense of humor and doesn't realize that today isn't the most optimal day to be sending out congratulatory emails.

I feel that I have to give this email two responses:

1. If this is real, I am completely humbled to be a recipient of the MVP Award this year. Blogging, speaking and educating are activities that I find very rewarding, and it's flattering to be recognized for them.
2. If this is just an elaborate joke, I'm thoroughly disgusted and saddened by the juvenile attempt at humor. People have feelings, ya' know!

How hard is it to send these emails on March 31st or April 2nd? That would clear up a lot of confusion.

P.S. I know it's real. Thanks Microsoft! I am truly honored. No joke.

Recently, I googled my first name. The search yielded some startling results. Not only was I surprised to find my modest blog on the front page, but... well... see for yourselves.

Sadly, soon after came the inevitable smack down.

It's on. Now that I've had a taste of power, I'm willing to go to great lengths to quench my thirst. Look out Hoffman! I don't care if you are my namesake...

You're next Screech. No bell will save you this time.

Today, while making some changes to my Plaxo Pulse profile, I was presented with the following error message:

Coffee immediately shot out of my nose.

Once I regained control of myself (and after taking the screenshot above), I clicked the X, and the message went away. I never did find out what that error actually was.

The biggest danger of working with my boss is, quite frankly, jealousy. Don't misunderstand me. It's not jealousy of his considerable programming chops or his modest good looks. It's his wide range of stalkers that evokes my pangs of envy. Nothing defines fame quite as definitively as the number and variety of one's stalkers.

Over the past years, I've declared a few people to be "my stalker."

First, there was Jason Follas because of his stalker-ish way of chasing me down to speak at the Northwest Ohio .NET User Group. Here are some choice quotes:

Jason showed a lot of promise, but his heart really isn't in it. This quote from his very first email to me clarifies his level of commitment as a stalker:

Oh yeah! Can you feel the love?

Then of course, there was Jeff McWherter. Jeff approached me this year at Tech Ed to discuss a talk that I had given a month earlier over a 1,000 miles away. Truthfully, Jeff was just being conversational, but I jumped all over his pleasantries with cries of, "Ha! You're my stalker now buddy!" Lately, I've been questioning how seriously Jeff has been taking his roll as a stalker. Recent encounters have involved him darting around corners while I shout, "HEY! Aren't you going to stalk me!? Why aren't you going through my trash or taking distant, blurry photos of me?"

I guess that I've just been trying too hard.

Until today.

Finally, I have real stalker of my very own: Dan Hounshell. That's right Dan. I read your blog, and I saw your post.

After seeing this photo, I'll be sleeping with one eye open.

A stalker of my very own.

I've finally arrived.

Those of you that know me will remember that I carry a full-sized keyboard in my laptop bag. I find it much easier to code and demo if I use the same keyboard all the time. So, I carry it with me. My keyboard is like a constant companion that goes wherever I go, and my recent trip to DevConnections in Orlando was no different. The birds were singing. The sun was shining. My keyboard was firmly secured under the flap of my bag... or so I thought. As I approached the Orlando hotel, I had no idea that my close friend's lifetime was near its end. There was nothing that would have alerted me to this fact. Suddenly, my trusted comrade slipped from the bag and shattered on the hard cement. And when I say "shattered", I don't mean that a few keys popped off. I mean that keyboard blood and guts were strewn everywhere. As I surveyed the gory scene, I realized that repairing my keyboard was out of the question. The ground was littered with twisted plastic shrapnel and warped springs. It had become my own proverbial "Humpty Dumpty". There was no way this egg was going back together again.

Believe it or not, this tragedy absolutely paralyzed me. Because I spend all of my time with the same keyboard, I am a complete novice (i.e. a "newbie") at using my laptop's built-in keyboard. With only the keyboard on my laptop, I was reluctant to do demos during the conference. I would sit in front of my laptop blushing and stammering into the keyboard like a seventh grade boy asking his first girl to a dance. I had to face the facts: I couldn't avoid replacing my dear friend. Only one questioned remained. Should I purchase the same model or go for an upgrade?

I spent some time looking online and finally settled on the Logitech G15 Gaming Keyboard. It's newer, sleeker and sexier than my old buddy, but it also has a very attractive feature: holes that I can use to tie it to my laptop bag. There are lots of other great features like the LCD screen and the extra 18 user-programmable buttons, but the holes were the selling point for me. No longer will I put my closest friends at risk.

Helpful holes allow me to use straps. YAARRR!!! (pirate-speak)

Securely attached to my Tom Bihn Super Ego.

This thing's not going anywhere!

This experience has served to cement a universal truth in my mind. It is the sort of axiom that I wouldn't mind having engraved on my tombstone at the end of my days. The idea is basically this: no matter how sophisticated humanity's achievements in technology, no matter how rich our medical advancements, gravity wins. Gravity always wins.

Words to live by.

Today I'm 32 years old.

To many of you, that might not seem very old. In fact, some of you might already calling me names like "young punk" or "whipper-snapper". To those people I say, "Get some teeth old man!"

Seriously, it's not that I feel particularly old, but this is the first year I'll actively exaggerate my age. If someone asks how old I am, I'll quickly answer that I'm 25. "25", of course, is a short way of saying that I'm 2^5 years old. I'm comfortable with that because it's not really a lie. It's not even stretching the truth. I'm being vague, flippant and maybe a bit of a smart ass, but I'm OK with that.

After this year, I'm going to start rendering my age in hexadecimal. Next year I'll be 21.