About Me

I've always had an interest in music and computers. Upon graduating high school, I attended the University of Minnesota. Majoring in Mechanical Engineering, I got immersed in Chemistry and Calculus. However, my great love of music proved to be too strong of a pull. I took several music courses and became all the more enthralled. I decided after that quarter to leave the 'U' and pursue music professionally.

I feel lucky to say I've had some successes with music. I've had the pleasure and honor of playing guitar for and alongside some of the Twin Cities' most respected musicians. My final band before returning to school, Equinox, was a Top 20 Japanese act, a top 40 act in Germany, and still receives airplay in many countries including Japan, Sweden, Brazil, and Spain to this day. Soon after my departure from Equinox, there was a major shift in personnel resulting in Equinox becoming Vox Tempus. When I left, we were in the midst of recording the follow up to Equinox's widely successful major label (JVC Victor) debut album. It took a few years to complete, but the album was finally finished, albeit under the new Vox Tempus name. It is an album that has gotten rave reviews worldwide. I'm proud to promote it and have the privilege of saying I played a major part for the three years of my membership with the band. Alas, the inherent frustrations of a musician's life with a family to support became too great. It was time to go back to school.

I enrolled into the Software Development program at Anoka Technical College (ATC) where I graduated with a 4.0 GPA. I had a blast taking all the classes. A whirlwind schedule and a very tough grade scale ensured me that studying was an absolute must in order to keep my head above water. While attending ATC, I was hired by Allina Hospitals & Clinics' Help Desk. Six months later, I was promoted within the department and was regularly tapped to train new employees.

14 months after joining the Help Desk, I was hired within Allina I.S. to my current position: Systems Programmer with the Operating Systems Group (OSG). This particular departmental jump from the Help Desk to OSG had never before been attained and has yet to be repeated. I am responsible for an equal mix of Allina's Linux and AIX (Unix) servers from the planning of new architecture to installing Linux and Unix on those servers to the day-to-day duties of a systems administrator. I am part of the Unix subgroup and it's OSG's responsibilty to oversee Allina's nearly one thousand servers to ensure that everything from testing environments to large scale projects with high media visibility run smoothly and reliably. It's a very dynamic position with quite a bit of change. It's a welcome challenge because there's always something new to learn. And, of course, once you learn something, you can bet it's changed!