About Me

I am a father and husband, both of which make me really proud. I'm a person who usually can't sit still for too long, lots to do and lots of things interest me. I like to fish, camp, climb and generally be outside as much as possible. Recently re-discovered my faith with my wife and am enjoying a life for a greater cause in the little ways that I can.

An animal lover, I currently feed 3 cats and 2 dogs along with keeping a salt-water aquarium. I have always had dogs, Jody introduced me to cats and I've grown to like them too (as much as you can like a cat). For now the cat's are going anonymous as they were uncomfortable about having their picture on the internet.

I've been a student at Iowa State University since the fall of 1993. It is a great college and I have learned a great deal as well as made a lot of good friends here. My original degree was in Animal Science / Pre-Vet, and I have since returned for classes in Microbiology and now a second major in Management Information Systems. Here is a list of all the classes I've taken over the years...

(above) Maggy is our Jack Russell - on left, Lola is our Boston Terrier - on right

(below) This was a long car ride with the dogs, so Lola was used for entertainment

Guitars

I started playing guitar somewhere @ around 17 years old. First guitar was a Peavey strat-copy plugged into a Peavey Bandit 100. I still play for fun and currently use a Fender acoustic w/ cutaway and pickups. Its nice and all I need. Currently am trying to learn as many DMB songs as possible, in the past I've tried a little classical, slide, and heavy-metal tunes. I like to just play along with favorite songs now and free-solo stuff with some simple scales.

About 3 years ago I got really interested in reef tanks after seeing some phenomenal tanks. For about a year I just read and surfed for info on the web, then around 1999 when we moved into our house I amassed all the stuff I needed to set up my first reef tank....

Fast forward to 2004, I still have the tank set up but need to invest some $ into it to get the lights and all the filtration working well again. Thanks to advice from Jody, we got rid of a nasty algae problem that plagued the tank. Caden is taking an interest gradually, so I am hoping to get it back into shape within the next year. Woah, they are are a lot of maintenance!

I took the on-line strengths-finder thing (Now, Discover Your Strengths, Buckingham & Gallup Org.). Real interesting concept in self-improvement, I like the concept of this book. It somehow came surprisingly close to predicting the "way I think"...

(update: Dec 04) Our whole team at work did this book together and it was really interesting. Definitely learned a lot about people in our team, we're hoping it will be something we can apply as we set goals for 2005.

I've always had an interest in the ocean and salt-water aquariums, this was the next logical step. While in Jamaica for our wedding I was able to do a 30' dive offshore after a short-course in the resort pool. My ears suffered, but what an experience! I've vowed to get certification with Jody so someday we can dive together.

One of the many hobbies that I have been introduced to by my dad, off-road motorcycles are one of my favorite adrenaline-based hobbies. Dad and I actually tried a few enduro races together. 100 miles of gnarly off-road obstacles from water-crossings to 75 degree hill-climbs, I don't think I ever finished a whole race.

There is nothing that is more amazing than the variety of life on Earth. Life and the many forms it takes have always interested me. Exposure to my dad's veterinary practice definitely helped encourage this interest. Some of the areas below are new interests discovered through work experience.

I have held an interest in computer programming since about the 5th grade when we did some sort of apple coding. I now have had exposure to a number of languages and applications.

I'd say the following categorization describes where I am at with the technical stuff:

Program or Language	Proficiency Level	Experience
Microsoft Excel (Decision Support)	High	Around 8 years overall, 4 within decision-support modeling as a manager
Oracle SQL	Moderate	Around 2 years, use it daily
C++	Some Exposure	1 semester
Visual C++	Some Exposure	1 semester
Visual Basic.NET	Some Exposure	Self-taught
Perl	Some Exposure	Self-taught, the "Llama Book" by O'Reilly
COBOL	Some Exposure	1 semester
Microsoft Access	Some Exposure	Use and responsible for multiple applications at work