User Profile

Me. Well, mainly my life consists of work, coffee, and sleep.

A Brief History. I was born and raised in a small rural town in Iowa, called Mt. Pleasant. I attended college at Iowa State University, where I earned a degree in Computer Science in 1998. After graduation, I went to work for IBM Global Services in Rochester, Minnesota. After about a year, I was increasingly unhappy with both my job and my life in the great white north in general, and in November 1999, I moved to Tucson, Arizona, where I started a job with The University of Arizona. I am still there, working as a Computing Manager for the Financial Services Office. I used to manage and maintain a network infrastructure of about 16 servers, and 200 desktop/laptop clients. We're a Microsoft shop, which means I was mainly playing with Windows, Exchange, IIS, SQL Server and such at work. Kindly keep all disparaging comments to yourself. I used to hate Microsoft, but after working with their products for the past 4 years, I've developed a strange sort of love/hate relationship with them. Now, I manage about half of our IT team -- specifically the Customer Service, Desktop Support, and Systems sub-teams. I just recently took this on, and I'm looking forward to the challenge, because I came to realize not terribly long ago that I was starting to burn out due to boredom, and management is something new.

I also recently started going back to school, and am in the Evening MBA program in the Eller College of Management at The University of Arizona. I'm expecting to receive that degree in August 2007.

When I'm not at work or at school, you're likely to find me sitting outside at Starbucks with a coffee and a book. Unless it's cold or rainy. Then I'll be inside. It's an addiction thing.

I like gadgets and toys. Unless they're broken. I used to find broken gadgets and toys a challenge, asking to be conquered. As I grow older, I really just want stuff to work. I have very little patience for broken things anymore. I also have very little patience for stupidity.

I drive an Audi. I love my Audi. I bought my Audi on a whim. I was bored one evening, and started browsing car manufacturer web sites. I'd just gotten a substantial raise at work. One week later, I took delivery. I used to drive a Honda Accord. Before that, I used to drive a Saturn. I liked my Accord and my Saturn well enough, but now that I've gone German, it will be difficult to do anything else. Someday, I'll drive a Porsche. Despite this paragraph, I'm really not a car person. I don't even know how to change my own oil.

I spend a lot of time in introspective reflection. It can be intensely depressing at times, but I've also come to realize that I've learned an awful lot about myself through doing it, and am better positioned than most to know what my life is lacking. Now if only I could figure out how to obtain those things, I'd be doing pretty well... :)

You can tell a lot of about a person by the music he or she listens to. Here's what's been playing on my iPod lately:



That's about all there is to say. Most of the entries in my journal used to be public. Recently, though, I am locking more things friends-only for various reasons. If you think you're my friend, drop me a line and I'll add you to my friends list if I know you. If I don't know you, don't bother. If you have a problem with that, maybe you should take that up with Mr. Laser.

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