Biography
The dawn of the 1980s was followed quickly with my arrival in the Washington DC area. From the start, I was a curious child with an insatiable desire to know -- and I wanted to know everything. When I arrived in Montessori school, I would sit by the magazine rack instead of laying on my mat. In the afternoons after kindergarten I read the newspaper with my grandmother. And as I grew older I devoured fact books and explanations of how the world around me worked. I developed a fascination with science and technology from the start and never passed up an opportunity to learn how those two fields made their magic.As the first decade of my life came to a close my interest in technology began to manifest itself in a love of the personal computer. At first I used it to type up papers for school, but soon I started writing toy programs on it, using it to play, and with the introduction of its first modem, as a way to learn more about the world. First with BBSes and then with a shell connection to the internet I found a whole new world on-line. The text files of Gopher gave way to the multimedia experience of the World Wide Web, Mosaic gave way to Netscape and Firefox, and Webcrawler gave way to Altavista and Google.
In middle and high school I headed up the television production facilities in both schools, making morning television programming, and specialty shows. I helped run school events, started a few clubs, and became communications director of the student government. I also created the first web site for my high school, and it was the first of its kind in the entire county. Academically I continued to pursue my interests in the sciences, taking as much as I could reasonably take -- doing five years of math in my four years of high school while taking as many higher level science classes as possible. In my sixteenth year I started my own business doing computer consulting and programming. That business would eventually help pay for my college studies and lead me into the field I now pursue in my professional life.
As the second decade approached the third I made my way to the rugged environs of Ithaca, New York where I began my studies in Electrical Engineering at Cornell University. It would be one of the most challenging experiences of my life, and one of the most intellectually rewarding. Outside of the classroom, I started to work at WVBR-FM, a unique radio station that is fully commercial and independent of the university, but owned by a corporation of students. I started as a DJ working the 2-6 AM shift and quickly worked my way up to afternoons and other positions -- first as a DJ trainer, then as Vice President of Station Training, and finally as the President and General Manager of the station. I count my experiences at WVBR as some of the most rewarding and enlightening of my life.
Firmly in my third decade as I graduated, I made my way back to the Washington area, and continued the work of my business, eventually deciding to go as a full time employee in my chosen field. Freed from the time restrictions that academic life had placed upon me, I was able to enjoy the added time to devote to my interests and recreation. I went to countless concerts downtown, explored the nightlife and dining that Washington has to offer, and did my best to have some fun. I went hostelling in London, Edinburgh, and Dublin with my best friend, took a cruise on the Caribbean to see Belize, Cozumel, Grand Cayman, and Roatan for New Year's one year, went back to Cozumel to do some scuba diving, and met a lot of wonderful people along the way.
I also rediscovered my love of the bicycle. With acquisition of my first car at 16, the bicycle didn't get much use, gathering dust in my father's garage. However, with traffic greatly reducing the quality of my life and a desire to integrate exercise into my daily routine I started commuting by bicycle. While initially challenging, it quickly became the best part of my day and I started keeping logs of my mileage. In 2007 I biked 2,500 miles, and in 2008 I topped 2,800. In the summer of 2008 I even went on a five day bike tour with my best friend doing the entire 184.5 mile length of the C&O Canal, camping along the way. In the summer of 2009 we added one more person to the team and biked from the outskirts of Pittsburgh, PA to Washington, DC in 8 days logging over 340 miles.
As you may have ascertained, I have always loved to travel, so it is fitting that I ended up finding the love of my life on a business trip to Tampa, Florida. I was in town for a week, and we were fortunate to meet early on in that week. The more we got to know each other, the more it became evident that we had to stay in touch. Dozens of flights later I asked her to marry me and she moved up here as soon as a transfer could be approved. We tied the knot in August of 2008, and every time I look into her eyes, I'm reminded that I'm the luckiest guy on earth.
As I write this, I am at the beginning of my fourth decade on the start of my 30th year. I look forward to a future filled with love, learning, and the unending drive to do more.