MicroConf US25 - NOLA - Part 1

I’m on the flight back from a 4 day trip to New Orleans for MicroConf.

I realized that I really haven’t taken much time to slow down and quietly think much on this trip. It’s largely been go go go and a lot of socializing.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s been great. And absolutely necessary. But I also know that before I get back to the rollercoaster that is life these days, I need to take some time to reflect.

So here goes. Here’s my “vibe writing” recap (ie: stream of consciousness and little to no edits) of my time at MicroConf 2025 in New Orleans:

The flight down on Saturday, March 15th took a little longer than expected due to storms in the south that resulted in us rerouting to Baton Rouge for about 2 hours or so so we could refill and wait out the storms. By the time we got to NOLA, the sun was setting and it was beautiful skies. I went to the hotel, dropped my stuff off and decided to find some dinner. Most stuff was a super long wait (at least 2 hours or so) but I was able to find a nearby place that looked interesting, had good reviews and had availability, called Maria’s Oyster and Wine Bar. It didn’t have a huge selection, but it looked like the kind of place my wife would like, which has become my primary criteria for choosing places these days.

There were only about 4 other tables seated when I got there (so pretty empty) but I decided to give it a shot anyways. I was hungry. My waiter was extremely nice and welcoming and he helped answer the mystery as to why the place was so empty on a Saturday evening: it was still early but they had also only opened about 6 weeks earlier. It was still pretty under the radar and mostly a place that other industry folk would come when they weren’t working.

I ordered a local Pilsner, the fried oyster salad and the tuna steak frites that came with a fantastic brandy cream sauce with peppercorns. After I absolutely devoured the meal, I took a slow stroll back to the hotel, threw on a John Wick marathon on the hotel tv and worked on a personal project way longer than I should have.

The next day, I woke up and checked the MicroConf app to see what was going on and noticed a couple of people talking about a free walking tour of the French Quarter. Now, I’ll be honest that I REALLY didn’t want to get up and go. But I promised myself that I wasn’t going to squander this trip and was going to say yes to as much as I could. Plus, one of the people going was someone that I followed and enjoyed on social media, so I thought: oh perfect! I’ll at least “know” one person. So I chimed in that I wanted to join, got ready and headed down to meet the group. When I got to the lobby, I immediately recognized Olly (previously mentioned social media person) and introduced myself. We spent some time trying to find the other people from our group but had little luck, so decided to get walking so not to be late. Turns out the rest of the group had already left and we were the last two. It was a lovely walk and it was a wonderful time for Olly and I to get to know each other a bit. He very quickly became one of my favorite people that I’d be able to easily fine and converse with any time I was feeling a little bit lost or out of place. Really, a lovely human being (thank you, Olly)!

We got to the walking tour and despite us being about 10 minutes late, the group was still waiting for us and going over some basic early history that we were able to easily jump into and not feel like we missed too much. I also immediately saw another familiar internet face, this time someone from the Rails community, who I’ve interacted with quite a bit but never met and was especially looking forward to meet: Adrian Marin. As the tour got going, we (along with his lovely wife) got to spend some quality time conversing and learning more about each other beyond our existing internet knowledge of each other.

The actual tour was incredibly wonderful and really helpful for historical context and orientation around the French Quarter. Our guide Sal was a band musician in the city and just such an incredible storyteller. He helped us avoid the super touristy spots while learning about a ton of important history that really helped shape this part of the city. I’d highly recommend doing this or a similar tour if you get to visit New Orleans for the first time.

Throughout the tour, we found the rest of the MicroConf people that had originally thrown out the walking tour idea and we all quickly became fast friends (looking at you, Marcel Farhle and Vova Feldman). After the tour ended, we all decided to grab lunch at the Royal House (which I later learned was a Frank Sinatra favorite, back when the neighborhood was largely Sicilian coughmobcough owned). The waitress sold me on their fried oyster po-boy and I was not disappointed. The group (8 of us at that point, including Nathan Freystaetter and his cofounder) also split some raw oysters (when on the coast, right?) and after decided to head to Brennan’s for their famous Bananas Foster. It felt like the show they put on preparing it for us, along with the confusion around their pricing model (“$14/person, 2 person minimum”, which ended up being $7 each), really helped gel the group camaraderie and we made our way back to the hotel for the conference welcome reception.

After freshening up, I made my way to the reception at the rooftop bar by way of the elevator and immediately upon the elevator doors opening, was greeted by the familiar faces of Andrew Culver, Wes Garrison and Keith Perhac (along with another half dozen strangers). I’ll tell you that there’s really nothing better than unexpected people yelling your name and requesting hugs as you enter an elevator (aside from your own kid running to give you a huge after being away). Can I order that as an add on upgrade at all my future hotel stays?

After signing in at registration and getting my name badge, I met up with some familiar faces to get oriented, settled and catch up. Then I started to make the rounds of finding and meeting people that I knew from the internet but hadn’t had a chance to meet in real life yet. People like: Colleen Schnettler, Lianna Patch, and Arvid Kahl.

But the beauty of the reception (and MicroConf in general) is that I also got to meet a ton of other people that I’d never been introduced to before. Being that the conference is relatively small (I believe only like 300 people?) but everyone there is an internet entrepreneur of some type. It’s extremely easy to walk up to a random person and introduce yourself and ask “What are you working on?” Or some variation of that. It’s really one of the most welcoming groups of people, all brought together by their mutual desire to build something new in the world that’ll make someone’s life better. Even through spirited debate and discussion, the intention to help each other become better. Sometimes that’s through business critique and refinement, while other times through simply trying to understand the world and current events happening around us better

I closed out the reception talking with a new friend, Jaakko Piipponen, who was also working on a (but not competing) accounting related business. Things were winding down at the reception so we decided to grab some food. As we were trying to find a nearby place, we were joined by Paul Reinheimer, who was drawn to us because all three of us were wearing plaid and that appealed to his Canadian disposition. We were joined by another last minute straggler, whose name I unfortunately never got, and we all made our way to try our luck at some nearby restaurants. After striking out at the first place (Peche) due to a more than 2 hour wait to be seated, we went to their sister restaurant only a few blocked down, named Gianna, for some Italian inspired cuisine and friendly getting-to-know-you conversations. I ended up getting the tuna and potatoes special, which was delicious, though lacking any real Cajun or Creole flair that I was hoping to experience (admittedly not the best place for that). After, we all just decided to head back and get some rest in preparation for the conference ahead.

(Holy shit, this is getting long… we might have to pick this up in another post…)