Not THAT Submariner!

Grant Fritchey (blog|twitter) Red Gate SQL Server Product Evangelist and long-time friend will be joining us on the next SQL Cruise scheduled for less than two weeks away.  We both took a few moments from our hectic schedules to do a little Q & A session… 

TF –  Grant, thank you for joining us on SQL Cruise Alaska.  Can you tell us a little about what you’re looking forward to on the cruise?

GF – The most exciting thing for me is that I’ll be on a boat and not stuck down in the engine room. After that, I’m really looking forward to the people that are going to be on the cruise. I already know a few of them and they’re great people, the kind you really want to spend time with and learn from. 

Editor’s Note:  Grant spent years in the miliary on board submarines.  Rumor has it that he booked his cabin right next to the engine room because he can’t sleep at night unless someone stands outside his room and hits steel plates with a sledgehammer. 

TF –  What do you plan on presenting while on the cruise?

GF –I’m going to give you basically a 90 minute brain dump on execution plans. I’ve got some stuff that I think people routinely miss that we we’re going to go over, plus a bunch on how exec plans work, how to read them, where to get info, all kinds of fun stuff.
 

TF –  Can you give us some insight on what you’ve been up to since joining Red Gate last year?  What have you found most surprising about leaving behind the day-to-day production DBA duties?

GF – I’ve only been with Red Gate about four months at this point. It’s still very much a learning experience for me. These guys move so fast that it’s hard to keep up with them, but I’m loving it. The biggest change, I haven’t had a server wake me up at 3AM in four months and I’m loving that too. Other than that, surprisingly, except for the amount of writing that I’m doing, this has been very much a job about databases so I’ve been running all kinds of backups and restores, tuning queries, monitoring systems, all the stuff you’d expect, I just do 99.99% of it with Red Gate tools. I’m really pleasantly surprised that I’m not only not going to degrade my skill sets in and around SQL Server, but I’ve got the opportunity to improve them.
 

TF – I know you’re planning on joining me on a snorkeling trip in Ketchikan.  Are you going on any other excursions while on SQL Cruise Alaska?

GF – Mrs. Scary and I really, really want to set foot on a glacier. We’re going to do that for sure. Other than that, no plans as of yet.

TF –Thank you for Red Gate’s continued commitment to SQL Cruise.  Does Red Gate have any suggestions for how we can  make SQL Cruise even better as we look towards our fourth cruise later this year?

GF – You’re welcome. You know Red Gate takes its commitments to the community very seriously. Never having been on a cruise, it’s hard to say what you can do to make them better.

TF – I’ll make it a point to follow up with you after the cruise then.  Just as Red Gate takes their commitments to the community seriously, we greatly value the partnerships we form with our sponsors.  We never purport to know it all and in my opinion this is a collaborative effort.
TF – You’ve written a great book on Execution Plans for SQL Server for Red Gate.  I keep finding myself going to that book.  What one suggestion would you offer to any SQL Professional facing the task of just learning how to work with execution plans?

GF – Look at the TSQL operator at the start of the execution plan first. There’s great information in there that is frequently missed.

TF –You and I are both involved to some degrees with The Boy Scouts of America.  While not roughing it at all on the SQL Cruise, we will be up in the Wilds of Alaska.  What are you looking forward to seeing in on this adventure?

GF –I’m really excited about seeing a glacier.  Those things fascinate me since I live in Massachusetts, which has a glacier carved landscape. I also wouldn’t mind spotting, from a considerable distance, a grizzly bear. A whale spotting or two would be good as well.

TF –I know this little place in Skagway where you can pet grizzly bears.  No I don’t. Conveniently there is a shack right next door where the owner of the grizzly petting zoo sells hooks and artificial limbs he makes in his own foundry.  No there isn’t.

TF – Back to the move from production DBA to SQL Server Evangelist; is there anything you miss from your old DBA life?

GF –Nope!  Except for the people. I worked with a great team and I’m sorry I had to leave them.
 

TF –You’ve been doing a great deal of travelling now that you’re with Red Gate.  What are some of your travel tips you’d recommend to those joining you on the Cruise?

GF –Pack as light as you can, and think about layers. Don’t bring a big coat, but do bring a long-sleeved shirt, a fleece and a wind-breaker or shell. I think it’ll be almost like packing for backpacking trip, but one where you also swim and go to nice restaurants occasionally.

TF – Well, Cruisers are all getting a SQL Cruise hat, fleece jacket, and t-shirt among other swag.  Hopefully we’ve helped with the “layers” bit.

TF – Grant, I’d like to thank you for sitting down (virtually) with me here and I really am looking forward to seeing you and Mrs. Scary again in just about ten days.

Grant Fritchey has twenty+ years experience in IT.  That time was spent in technical support, development and database administration. He works for Red Gate Software as a Product Evangelist and writes articles for publication at SQL Server Central, Simple-Talk, PASS Book Reviews and SQL Server Standard. He have published two books, ”Understanding SQL Server Execution Plans” and “SQL Server 2008 Query Performance Tuning Distilled.”  Grant is one of the founding officers of the Southern New England SQL Server Users Group and it’s current president.  He also work on part-time, short-term, off-site consulting contracts.

In 2009 and 2010 Grant was awarded as a Microsoft SQL Server MVP.

In the past he has been called rough, intimidating and scary. To which he usually replies, “Good.”