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Biography

Boy, I really am a coding fool. I started programming when my Dad bought the family an Atari 400. It came with a Basic cartridge and I had as much fun playing with it as with the rest of the games we had. He followed it up with an Atari 800XL and by then it was Turbo-Basic XL that I used.

Subsequent years were followed up by Turbo Pascal in high school, C and C++ in college, and Java when it was the hottest new thing around. Ultimately though, it was C# that I settled with; partly because the first place I work was a Microsoft shop but mostly because I think it is one of the better languages that I've used (and it continues to get better).

For the last ten years I've been working as a software consultant in Denver.

My first client was with the Department of Energy at the Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site (a now defunct nuclear weapons production facility). The company that I worked for was a subcontractor to perform software development services at the site and I was the Web guy (or the "Kid" as one of the older co-workers used to call me). While everyone else was busy writing Oracle Forms applications and preparing for Y2K, I was one of few Web developers on-site, and as the Web started to 'bubble', I got quite busy and was involved in quite a few projects over the years.

It was during my time at RFETS that I really had fun coding. Many of the projects were relatively small; one to two person teams would design, build, and write the entire application. Most projects were no longer than three to six months long. I had the opportunity to learn Oracle from our over-abundant supply of Oracle developers and SQL Server, in turn, was taken up quite easily. I got to work on projects used to track data during building decontamination and destruction, for managing timekeeping for site employees and subcontractors, for site asset management, and in a number of other different areas. I got to play with PDAs with built-in barcode readers, write software to interface with data loggers used to measure and record alpha and beta radiation, and even use a wearable computer. I think it can be said that it was a very interesting place to work.

Eventually though, I had left RFETS to work from our office with some of our other clients. Two of the most notable clients were the public health departments of Santa Clara County, CA and Clark County, NV. I spent the next few years working on a number of medical and health-related Web applications for these two counties. It was during this time that I focused on developing applications in .NET and C#.

In the end, I decided to move on from Denver and return home to Michigan. During my ten years away, I was missing out on the ever-increasing number of nephews and nieces being born (not to mention the children of my friends). I don't think I was satisfied with the occasional trip home. I wanted to stick closer to my family.

Until recently, I continued to telecommute with my employer for the last couple years. Software was just as easily written at my desk at home in Michigan as it was at my desk in the office in Colorado. But telecommuting wasn't going to last forever and work eventually dried up.

So this is where I am. Taking a short break from work for now but I'll get a new job soon.