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In January 2006, I was invited to participate in Google's first conference for women engineers which was held at their main headquarters in Mountain View, California. It was a cold and rainy Saturday, which made for lousy picture-taking, so the following are mostly "press" photos or snapshots by "googlers". All expenses -- even the tips! -- were paid for by Google. Great trip, fun place.

Google Headquarters, Mountain View (California) Main Entrance	Follow The Yellow Brick Road. A long walkway leads toward the main courtyard at the Googleplex. The walkway is made of narrow yellow bricks that curves through gorgeous garden beds.	In the foreground is the famous volleyball court, a favorite of Sergei Brin. It is located right in the middle of the central courtyard.	Volleyball is *very* popular at Google. To hear them talk, there is always a game going on.
Building 41, which we toured during the Workshop.	Odd to see in this photo, in real life the architecture is visually interesting and conveys a lot of energy and creativity.	A natural benefit of California is it is almost always 'outdoors' weather.	It's true: Googlers (that's what they call themselves) can bring their pets to work.
Free food, all the time... There are lots of places to eat full meals, to just grab a snack, or nab a drink. The variety is amazing and yummy.	Games and toys are everywhere in the Googleplex. So are electric massage chairs, exercycles and other work out equipment, sofas, lounge chairs, reading centers... etc.	Yes, the Googleplex has cubicles, but it also has lots of offices and group spaces. All the cubes seemed to be decorated with 'attitude'	Sergei Brin and Larry Page (an official photo from the Google info pages)
A globe similar to this one was displayed on a large (42"?) plasma screen. Parts of the world light up, sending narrow beams into the air where they connect as you watch net traffic flow around the world. Quite amazing.

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