I place a great deal of importance on a proper work/life balance. I've worked 20hr weeks and I've worked 100+ hr weeks, and neither is optimal in terms of productivity or personal satisfaction. I have a wonderful family and there's nothing that I like more than spending time with them. We enjoy traveling, skiing, kayaking, skating, hiking, boating, camping, golfing, crafts and many other activities. When it comes to my career I've learned that it's not the specific technology or product that drives my interest, it's the type of problem that needs to be solved. I thrive when given the opportunity to solve challenging multidisciplinary problems which require hands on experience and the ability to acquire new skill sets. I enjoy and seek out opportunities to work with diverse teams of skilled professionals where everyone can learn and grow from each others knowledge and experience. With new skills comes the ability to apply them to my hobbies. Often my hobbies intersect with my professional interest whether it be rewriting my home boiler logic on a PLC, automating a home brewery, or learning rudimentary C++, PHP, and SQL in order to provide remote monitoring with an Arduino. Learning will always be a part of my life, and often results in my wife or friends shaking their head at the craziness of what I've created when I don't have to worry about CTQ's, scalability, and deadlines.
This site was created to provide some additional background regarding who I am as a person. If you're looking for a quick rundown of my skills and experiences, check out my Linkedin page for my resume and more information. Meanwhile here is a brief summary:
I've been fortunate enough to travel to interesting destinations across North America, Europe, and Asia for work and pleasure. Each trip has been a great adventure and we will never forget the people we've met along the way. Some of my most memorable trips include Jerez(Spain), Munich, 22hrs in Prague, Yellowstone, Gaspe, and Hong Kong.
When the weather is nice I'm likely in the woods, the pool, the boat/kayak or occasionally on the golf course. My daughters are just old enough to start taking short backpacking trips, and we had our first adventure this past fall. When the cold weather moves in we do not lock ourselves indoors. Our family decided to learn to ski last year and apparently it's easier to learn a new sport when you're 6 years old than when your 37. After an afternoon of putting on quite a display at the bunny hill, I figured out how to do a proper hockey stop and it was all downhill from there. I also started setting up a small rink in our backyard now that my oldest daughter is playing hockey. So many fun hobbies, so little time....
Earlier I eluded to some of oddball projects that I've worked on including home boiler automation, homebrew automation, and remote monitoring. Some of the more off the wall projects include adding a solar setup + fish finder in my kayak, Baby Stroller powered cell phone charger, and low cost GPS based invisible fence shock collar. While the end results are fully functional (though not really marketable) one of the biggest benefits had been how applicable the knowledge I've gained has been to projects in my professional career. For example...
Once after having a detailed design discussion on incorporating SCR's to provide almost half a megawatt of heating to a fuel system, one of electrical engineering team members complemented my knowledge of SCR's. Being a mechanical engineer at heart, I had to grin as I explained that I had previously researched SCR's when I incorporated one to power 2 small 850 watt heating elements in my homebrew RIMS design. From a control standpoint, scaling up the power several orders of magnitude didn't make much difference.
There are plenty of other examples including learning the Modbus protocol by connecting an Arduino to a plc, basic coding skills, or simple tasks such as wiring up a basic 4-20ma device. Much of these hands on skills were not taught at University and it was a differentiator for me, especially early in my career.
Outside of my nerd projects, I also enjoy wrenching on fast cars (did I mention I'm working on a frame off resto of a '69 GTO?), jamming on the guitar or drums in a band, the occasional hunting/fishing trip, and gardening, especially if it involves using a large tractor. While I don't enjoy it as much other activities I can handle most aspects of residential construction. I can confidently say that the day after I retire (many years from now), I will not be wondering what I'm going to do.