It all started over 29 years ago at 5:13 pm in Northwest
Hospital in Seattle, Wa. Yep, that's right, I'm from the good
ol' PNW. That's the Pacific NorthWest for you I-like-to-see-the-sun-occasionally-and-be-dry-and-I've-never-stepped-on-a-banana-slug-in-bare-feet-before people.
Seattle was a happy time, but things change. In 1987, my
family moved to Centerville, Ut. so my dad could take a much
nicer job. I decided to go with them. I was a little shaken
though when, on the first day at my new house, I saw a
tumbleweed blow/roll down the street. "Why," I thought, "had I
been taken from the beautiful Garden-of-Eden-esque Seattle to
the middle of a friggin' desert?" Well, it has taken a while to change
this attitude, but Utah
has some very nice features and is overall a pretty good
place to live, as long as you don't like to drive fast. See,
since there's very little crime here, all the cops (and there's
a lot of them) congregate on the roads to issue traffic tickets.
However, I think it's a great place to raise a family, and if I
had one, I could second that thought. I think though, that if I
could choose anywhere to live, it would be in San Luis Obispo,
Ca. It's absolutely beautiful down there.
But this is supposed to be about me. So I went to Utah during
the sixth grade and have pretty much lived here since, except
for a two year stint I did as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
in New York City, speaking Spanish. That was a difficult
but rewarding experience; I'm glad I went. I've worked quite a
bit also, being such things as a paper-boy, produce-picker,
dishwasher, busser, and cook in a Mexican restaurant,
electrician, painter, grounds-keeper, slave, odd-jobsman, media
services guy (don't know how else to phrase that), UNIX
administrator, computer lab guy, and some other things as well.
Well, anyway, I graduated with a B.S. in Computer Engineering from Brigham Young University in Provo, Ut.
In '99, I received some good job offers and started going to school
part-time, taking an occasional general elective class, thus explaining
the very long time to graduate. But hey, "lots of people take 8 years to
graduate. Yeah, they're called doctors" (Tommy Boy). What's important is
that it's finally over. So, anyway, the
first of these full-time experiences was at Novell, which, though it gets a lot
of criticism, is a great place to work. However, in 2000, I got
sucked away with a nice offer from
Linux Networx where I did all sorts of different jobs.
Finally in October of 2001, I made the decision to leave work
and go back to school in order to finish my degree. That wasn't
an easy decision, especially since they offered me a lot of $$ in
December to stay on as a Sales Engineer.
But I quit work at the end
of 2001 and started school full-time again with a doozy of a schedule.
Hard work paid off though and I got a decent GPA for that semester. In
the Spring, I had hoped to get an engineering internship somewhere, but
alas, the economy stunk and no jobs were to be found. Linux Networx
wanted me back as a Sales Engineer, so I joined them again for the Summer
at an hourly wage (very significantly less than what they had offered me
to be a Sales Engineer in December of '01), but it was a good job. I hadn't
really planned on working in the Fall, but they wanted me to keep working, so
I worked out a nice schedule that let me telecommute three days a week. That
was nice since I lived 40 minutes from work.
So, in the Fall, I worked and just had 3 classes, one of them being a golf class,
though the two hard EE classes sure kept me busy. While I was pretty nervous
about passing one of the classes (and thus nervous about actually graduating),
I ended up doing fine in the class, and now I'm a free man except that I have no
time due to work. I accepted an offer from Linux Networx as a Systems Engineer
where I do a lot of different things. Probably the main duty is architecting
the very large clusters sold. I'm often the go-to guy for lots of technical things
for the Sales department. I've done a bit of CAD work
and maintainance, but probably not any more. I'm a little sad about that, since it
actually took my degree into consideration. But hey, that's life.
Oh, as I mentioned earlier, I was a Sales Engineer for a little bit, but I've sort of
taken on many of the same duties in my present position. For a
system
we recently sold to Los Alamos National Labs, I was
the technical lead, so I was asked to go down there for some negotiations we had
with them to secure and finalize the deal. I was told it would be good experience to sit
and see how things are done. When the CTO (Chief Technical Officer) was to give
the big technical presentation describing our offer, I would actually get to
open my mouth and provide any needed details about the system. Well, I had made up
some slides for the CTO to use when talking about the system, and when I told him he
needed to look at them (so he'd know what he was talking about), he told me I was
going to give the presentation! I was a little surprised, but when the time came, I
did it. Afterwards, the COO (Chief Operating Officer) started lavishing praise on me,
but I figured it was just to try to get back on my good side, since we had a bit of a
falling out last winter. But apparently he told others too, and so they sent me to Korea
and Taiwan also. That was a cool experience. So anyway, that was a long way to say that
I do some Sales Engineering stuff too, like giving presentations to customers. Most recently, I've been on the road nearly every week with the occasional weekend vacation to my home in Utah.
Besides just a brief log of my life, I'll mention a couple
other things. I like the outdoors a lot, though I never seem to
get to enjoy them as much as I'd like. I would attribute this to
either not having the time, or not having anyone to go with.
Marriage has both pros and cons, but I think a major pro is
the fact that you always have somebody to do stuff with. But I
also like computers; in fact it wouldn't be too much of an
exaggeration to say my life revolves around them. Yet I desire
to be considered a well-rounded fellow rather than a pure geek. I took
a geek quiz recently and scored very poorly, so that gives me some
hope that I'm not a complete loss to society.
In my attempt to achieve the status of not-a-complete-geek, I try to promote my zeal
for current events. I love the news and international affairs. I
subscribe to Time and The Economist. Time
is a great magazine for a well rounded review of what's going on
in the US. However, The Economist is an excellent source
for unbiased professional writing on the international scene.
One of the things I like about it best is that it is not an
American magazine and therefore views the US as just another
country, albeit a powerful one. It isn't afraid to offer a
little criticism or praise on different issues. It's interesting
to see what other countries think about us Yanks. I also read the
New York Times which generally
has good writing, but with an obvious left slant to much of it. Basically,
the regular Op-Ed writers criticize everything President Bush does,
and that gets quite tiresome to me.
But besides all the current
events stuff, I like other things. I love food, especially ice cream
(Breyers is the best) and my grandmothers lasagna. I very much like
being a guy and I like cars and tools. I started a nifty tool collection
in my last apartment, complete with a big 'ol Craftsman tool chest. It all
sat in my bedroom, as I had no garage to put it in. I also like water
sports and cruising around in boats, though I have to admit I'm really bad
at those sports. And of course, I like girls.
So, now you know a little bit about me. There's more too, but I've already
rambled enough, so you'll just have to get that info the old fashioned way --
getting to know me.
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