Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

Brain Exercises: Fun Away from Work
I do like using my brain and trying different activities. Trying to solve T-SQL puzzles, or writing some code, or even playing some games that require me to think.

Recently my wife and I took a cruise. We’ve done this before and one of the things we’ve enjoyed it the trivia contests. They’re fun and they tax your memory a little, and reveal how much you know about the world around you. A few years ago we (with my son) won one of the contests and got a pin. This time we were hoping to repeat as winners at least once during the week.

We learned there are lots of smart people. We tried a few different contests and were close, but multiple questions away from winning. There are usually 16 questions, of various points, and we often knew 10-13, but often multiple teams fared better. Especially with the last, bonus question, which was worth more points. A few things we didn’t know:
- Italian snack food made in 600AD inspired by children praying (pretzel)
- how many stars are on the New Zealand flag (4)
We did get a few things right
- Australian snack made from leftover brewers yeast (vegemite)
- honey never spoils (true)
One of the days had a Michael Jackson theme. We are big fans, and as we listened to the songs, we knew most of them. The one we didn’t know, and in fact only one of the 25 or so teams knew, was Liberian Girl. One that my daughter knew, which none of us did, was Chicago. That was the bonus question and we needed it as we won by one point.

We got a sticker for the win, which was fun, but it was nice to stop and try to think under pressure, but not too much pressure.

We won a second time, this one with TV Show intros. That was truly a group affair. I didn’t know many, but between my wife, my daughter, my son and his finance, we tied with 19/20 points with 2 other teams. We got a tiebreaker, and my son recognized the OC Theme, which one one else knew and I got a second sticker.

This makes me think I ought to do some trivia at a Day of Data sometime.
June 22, 2026
Changes, Happiness, and a Few Tears

Change is inevitable for most of us. The jobs we hold, the places we work, the people we know, even our families grow and change over time. As I get older and live longer, I’ve learned to accept, appreciate, and flow with changes. I might resist, delay, embrace, or anticipate tomorrow, knowing there is always a positive and negative side to things.

This week, one of my colleagues retired. Annabel has been a part of Redgate nearly as long as I have, and we’ve worked together for many years. If you’ve ever attended a Redgate event, live or online, she likely had a part to play in the planning, organizing, execution, financing, and every other part of the process.

My colleague, Allison, made a wonderful post yesterday, on Annabel’s final day with memories and thoughts from their time together. I wrote my own post with pictures and memories of our time together. There are so many more, and every time I think about our history, I’m touched, blessed, thrilled, and sad.

At PASS Europe last week, we said goodbye to Annabel at the last event she’s worked on. We toasted, laughed, and cried. She shed tears, which is a rarity, but Grant and I probably cried the most. She’s been a part of our lives and careers for many, many years.

Even typing these words brings tears to my eyes.

The future brings opportunity and excitement. It also brings sadness and wistfulness of the past. I can enjoy the memory of what I’ve experienced, miss the way things were, balancing those feelings with the my view forward to what is coming.

I can also think about what didn’t go well previously. We’ve had some issues at events, challenges, stressful times. Both at events, and while working with others in technology. I can learn from the past, be proud of the war stories, be glad we got past the failures, celebrate our successes, and plan to do better tomorrow.

The thing I miss most about growing older and moving forward are the people who I enjoyed spending time with. Those are the memories that stick with me more than the projects, the successful tech solutions, the elegant and fast code, the awards, bonuses, and achievements.

I miss the humans who have touched my life, and hopefully, whose lives I’ve touched.

I wish Annabel the best in retirement, I’m excited for where she journeys tomorrow. I hope those of you reading this make, cherish, and enjoy the great friends in your life.

Steve Jones

Listen to the podcast at Libsyn, Spotify, or iTunes.

Note, podcasts are only available for a limited time online.

June 19, 2026
A Career of Memories

Annabel retired from Redgate Software this week. Across most of my career at Redgate, I’ve participated in many events, some we hosted, some we sponsored. At most of these events, Annabel has been a part of organizing, financing, executing (or all three) the events with me. From SQL in the City to SQL Saturdays to Redgate Summits to the PASS Summit, she and I have been in so many cities and venues around the world.

She has become a dear friend, and someone I look forward to seeing. A friendly face, a supportive friend, a joy to be around.

I’m happy for her future, sad she’s moving on, and grateful for the time we shared together. I look forward to quiet lunches and drinks, but will miss the chaos of travel and events.

I have so many memories across the years. Annabel might be the person I’ve worked with the most in my career. We’ve stood on stages together. I don’t have a picture of us, since I’m often on stage, but here she is with Kendra.

We’ve prepped for broadcasts

and she’s delivered the openings.

We’ve celebrated after events in the US

In Australia

We’ve had so many smiles, together

and with friends.

We’ve sat in meetings (clearly she’s not as excited a Becky)

We’ve had so many group shots

We’ve had fun

We’ve worked ourselves hard

We’ve celebrated family

And we’ve even gone to a deserted island

If you’ve enjoyed a Redgate event, you likely have Annabel to thank.

I wish her well in retirement and I look forward to hearing how wonderful life is over lunch in Cambridge this fall.

June 19, 2026
Follow Your Hunch

For a while, I kept seeing that the cost of writing code was approaching zero. So many people felt that with an AI LLM, the costs would go way down to produce software. I’m not sure that’s true. In fact, some companies are finding they spend more on AI tokens than salaries.

However, the ability to produce more code, experiment with ideas, or generate proof of concepts has gone up. Whether it’s worth the cost or not depends on the engineer, but some organizations are finding that they can try more things than they would ever had time to try in the past. The time of engineers was the constraint, and if you can afford the cost, AI LLMs can relieve that time pressure.

Maybe the ability to get more done with agents means you should follow one of your hunches in software. Maybe you should try something.

Be thoughtful in your approach, use the LLM wisely, and learn to guide it efficiently, but use it to try an experiment that you might not think you have time to explore. Try an alternative. Implement something in a new way. OR implement it yourself and set the AI loose, asking it to work in a different way. You certainly could tell the LLM not to use your approach and try something different.

To me, the big advantage of an AI agent is it gives me time, something that I see as the most impactful constraint in my life. I’d like to get more done, but I’m not willing to work a lot more. Using an AI agent with a measured approach lets me tackle things that I might not otherwise get done. Certainly not as quickly as I get them done, and certainly not without stealing some personal time.

I get more done at work, without working more. I’m not working less, but I’m more effective. That’s what I’ve always aimed to do.

Steve Jones

Listen to the podcast at Libsyn, Spotify, or iTunes.

Note, podcasts are only available for a limited time online.

June 17, 2026