For seven years I did my testing work under the impression that it belonged to my company and the only word I said about it in public were to celebrate and point out where to find my name in the shipping product (for the first few products) to those who knew me the best, and I would write a traditional "new feature overview" for my Graphic Designer friends and the customers I'd meet at user group meetings. All the while I was blogging away in my private blog since 2000 almost daily, building a readership of people who love fashion and lipgloss, along with a few programmers. I met a young Scottish programmer by the name of Gordon Christie who was kind enough to spend his evenings playing online chess with me after I had my first surgery, when I'd still not adjusted to being in pain, simply because it helped me stop crying to focus my mind on something else that was hard. He helped me,even though I never won against him, and at best the game would last longer than the time I lost before. When it came time for his "Final" project to graduate college (they call it something else in the UK likely with another "u") I was glad to help him out with some testing. It was a home automation project, so I'm sure he was annoyed a bit when I turned off his lamps at 2am his time just to see if the fact they were already off would be ignored or would just switch them on. Awake and fixing the issue, he then learned that testers may be slightly evil even when we are doing something good to help out. He got his first degree, and I got my first chance to collaborate with someone outside of Adobe and I realized that the work I do for my software belongs to my company, but I have ideas that have value outside of the products I work on and I am a tester regardless of where I work.

In 2008 I liked the idea of getting in to a conference for free, and the economy was terrible and I knew there was no way I was going to get to attend a conference if I had to pay. That is why I wrote an abstract for PNSQC to present for my first time. There is a video somewhere of me finding out that my abstract was accepted, and it is hilarious! I was so enthused and shocked that they were going to let me speak. My mood changed drastically when I found out about the technical paper. Man, the first set of review comments I got I nearly quit and I had a million reasons, starting with the fact that I never wanted to write a technical paper and I wasn't a writer anyhow. The paper needed to be "rewritten" and wasn't "technical" according to one reviewer. I am glad there is no video that exists of my unfair comments and whining at that point. I nearly didn't present that paper because of stubbornness, but luckily I finished it by deadline and fell asleep on my laptop keyboard directly after the rewrite. I took my face, gridded indentation and all, and sent the paper to some very experienced authors and presenters for future revisions. They came back with all sorts of suggestions. I was able to go through several slide reviews and three dry runs of the presentation itself. Incorporating feedback is the reason my first public presentation went well and was selected as "Best Paper" for the followup presentation. I want to continue to improve my writing as well as offer peer review because I know how powerful good feedback can be. I want the time investment of Gordon Christie and all other people who have invested their time and energy into my growth to see that it was worth it and that I'm improving. As a new author I contribute ideas and effort to software testing, and I accept feedback so that I can reach my potential.