Personal

I want you to get a picture of me not through what I say about myself but from my interests and ideas. This is kind of like the housing market. If a listing says "Great Potential" and "Fantastic House" be afraid. However, if it says "Granite Counter tops, Viking Appliances, Hardwood Flooring, New Anderson Windows...." then it's probably worth a look. Basically, I could say I'm friendly and nice, but that may not be true from your point of view. I do have a lot of interests and I'm very vocal with my ideas and opinions. I also enjoy a good debate.

Other than that, things that aren't worth their own page will appear here. For example, I play set and solve rubik's cubes. In fact, I wrote a computer version of set that I may put up here or rewrite for more current technologies. I love Legos.

Computers are a huge part of my life. I work and play on them. Before you all jump to conclusions, I also enjoy being a social person. As you read through more of the personal section, you'll discover there is a lot more to me than my geek life.

That said, I've grown up with computers. My parents bought their first computer the year I was born. No, it was not a punch card system, much to my dismay. It was an Osborne. I'm sure I elicited a few low whistles from those in the know. I started programming basic on my Tandy when I was five. I've had a long hard love/hate relationship with many programming languages.

One of the reasons I've stuck with technology is it's somewhere I can be constantly challenged. I am always facing new problems and creating new solutions. Most of my life falls in line with this. In everything I do, there's always some new goal in my sights. I tend not to stick with things that I can't see a specific improvement path for myself. Technology evolves so quickly that I barely have time to breathe while learning all the new things I'm interested in.

The picture on the front page for my personal section is a picture of my big fuzzy dog. Like most animal lovers, I am absolutely exuberant about my boy. He's awesome. His name is Technic. That's right, he's named after the Lego block.

One day, when I was around eight years old, I told my mom that I wanted to get a dog and name him Legoes after the Lego block. He was going to be a schnauzer. On thanksgiving a few years later we went to the breeder and bought a miniature schnauzer who was subsequently named Legoes. He lived a long happy life to be a twelve year old cranky protective dog. This started the convention of naming all our dogs after Lego blocks.

Shortly before Legoes died, I went to California and brought home a giant schnauzer. That is Technic. Not long after that my mom sent me back to CA to the same breeder to get her a giant schnauzer. Her name is Tyco after the Tyco building blocks. Due to unusual circumstances regarding Tyco (unusual health problem), the breeder gave us another dog. Her name is Duplo after the super sized Lego Block. So you see, I have a bit of a dog and lego obsession. I still love the building blocks and I built one of my log home plans out of them.

Technic will likely get Photo albums dedicated to him. Right now you can see many of him in the Cream album.

I really don't pay attention to current TV or Music. I tend to stay away from popular media that doesn't stand the test of time. Backstreet Sync and Michelle Duff just don't interest me. I don't like spending time sitting in one place staring only at a linear motion story. Therefore, I don't watch many current TV shows or movies.

That said, I own all of Star Trek on DVD except Enterprise (Yeah, I'm still bitter about Enterprise being so horrible). I am also a browncoat. What's that you say? It's a Firefly fan. Firefly is the forgotten series created by the maker of Buffy and Angel. I think it was his best work and one of the best shows to ever see the little screen.

As a geek, I am a Star Wars fan as well. And by Star Wars, I mean Episodes IV, V and VI. I've also read a lot of the books, but let's ignore that for now. I also like the Lord of the Rings movies. You'll notice he's not listed in my favorite authors on the reading page. Yep, that's cause I don't like his writing. It's documentary style and puts me to sleep. However, he creates amazing worlds and I've found the movies to be one of the few acceptable translations of a book to the big screen. I'm not starting that flame war now, however I'll happily debate it with you in person.

I am told I should watch Battle Star Galactica or whatever. One day, I may. Thus far very few of my friends that have similar taste to me have recommended it. This is not encouraging so I have not made the attempt. Also, I refuse to watch weekly shows. I don't have the ability to be on the same channel at the same time one week to another.

One other show that I have watched a good portion of is West Wing. Before you jump to any conclusions, you should probably read the political section of the philosophy area. I like west wing and it's the only show I can think of that I want to buy on DVD (and haven't done so yet).

Thanks to someone who will remain nameless, I have become focused on health and fitness. I'm still struggling to define exactly what I want out of being healthy. The nameless one was the first person to convince me that I should take a more active role in my own health. In the past, good health would come and go with the weather. Now I spend a considerable amount of thought on everything I eat during the day.

The thing that surprised me most is that it isn't as hard as I thought it would be. At first it was hard to resist all the food I shouldn't be eating. Furthermore, I always wanted larger portions than is healthy. As of this writing (12/14/2006) I've been eating healthily for over a year with very little lapse. I also chose to write this now because I had a somewhat glutenous weekend that reminded me just how important it is that I continue to eat well.

I have also been talking to a variety of health crazy people ranging from the all natural to the vegan. I have yet to find a style of specific eating that both appeals to me and is really healthy. Vegetarianism/Veganism isn't particularly possible for someone who has been allergic to soy (as far as I can tell). All natural health food simply isn't practical based on time restraints. But I do try and keep my faster food to healthier easy stuff.

Through it all I'm still not sure why I've taken on this new endeavor. I thought it might have gone away in time but every time it slips it simply gets reinforced. This past weekend made me realize how easy it can be to slip into old habits. As of tomorrow I'm going back to a stricter dietary style. For me this means simply controlling portions to greater degrees and not having that medium iced mocha raspberry latte I love so much.