I am a computer programmer that resides in Arlington, TX. Beyond computer programming, my interests include playing board games, golfing, reading, and traveling. I am currently winding down my career and looking forward to retirement. Just what I will do for retirement I am not sure of. Part of me wants to purchase a motorhome and become a nomad traveling throughout North America, while another part of me wants to try the nomad part on a boat.
I am an active life member of American Mensa , having served on the board of directors for my local chapter 6 of the the last 8 years. I am also the webmaster of our site.
I was born in Minnesota and spent most of my life residing in that state, graduating from Woodbury High School in 1977. I enlisted in the USMC after high school but was medically discharged due to a problem with my left knee, which as it turns out is arthritis. I completed one year at the University of Minnesota but dropped out in my 2nd year as I had been offered full time status in a job I held in transportation management. I worked for 7 different companies over 26 years in that industry. As I grew older, I tired of the cold winters and ended up moving to TX. I have also lived in Florida on 2 seperate occasions.
It was while working in transportation management that I found i had some talent with the computer systems that the various companies used. I was able to catch on to the systems very fast and eventually taught myself HTML, and some basic JavaScript and VBScript which I used to create a website for the company I was working for at the time. I then took some programming classes at St Paul Technical College, where I used this new found knowledge to freelance and build other websites using Active Server Pages technology. One of my clients was a New York, NY based company that built computerized pianos called Computer Klavier. I wrote a number of programs for them and also a couple of different websites for them. While I was working full time in transportation management, I continued to do freelance programming now branching out into PHP and ASP.Net.
I moved to TX in April 2004. In 2005 I saw an ad looking for an asp programmer that would also do tech support. I applied and got the job and have been with that company now for over 17 years. I have moved up in that company going from a junior programmer level position to being a senior level programmer, then the department manager. One day the owner of the company came up to me and told me that he wanted me to make some changes to the corporate website, specifically the page that listed some of the key people. He said that I needed to change the title of my job to be Vice President of Software Development, which is what my official title is to this day.
I have twins, a son and daughter, that both reside in MN. My daughter is married and has a brilliant daughter of her own. I am hoping they will join me in Mensa some day.
Politically speaking I consider myself to be a moderate independent. There are some issues that I tend to be more liberal on and others that I tend to be more conservative on. I have gotten more involved in politics recently and am not afraid to let people know where I stand on the issues that I feel strongly about.
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