CV | Portfolio
Who am I?
I'm George, I live in Arlington, Virgina, and I write. When I'm not writing, I program. The inverse is also true. I've been around PCs since they were small enough to fit on a (large) desk. I spent my kindergarten getting kicked out of the computer lab because I 'hacked' the system and finished my friend's lab work for him. Granted, the act of 'hacking' was simply realizing that the passwords were our birthdates, but it was enough to get me kicked out.
I was even the first kid in my neighborhood with 3 computers and a LAN.
I was introduced to programming through college, with courses in C++, Java, and C#. I promptly picked up a book on Perl and started learning that.
Go figure.
I spent some time in the Army, first as a Forward Observer, then as a stint as a programmer, where at least part of my time was spent extending a Microsoft Access Database application (shudder) to send reports to multiple government agencies. After I got out of the Army, I finished college and took a contract for Perl web programming. When that contract ended I spent a year as a System Administrator for Manheim Auctions. Perl and C# once again came in handy, and I'm probably one of the only System Administrators that spent more time writing code than Administrating Systems. Talk about a flashing sign, right?
In my day work I use C# to maintain desktop applications. In the past I've worked on web applications, both ASP.NET and its younger (and cuter) sister, ASP.NET MVC. I hate to be pigeonholed as a '.NET' guy since I really don't care what language it is, I'm interested in it.
Side Projects
When I'm not doing this (work), that (gaming), or the other (blogging), I'm probably working on a project. Recently, I've begun working on a mashup for FirstPartyPay.com, and I'm also currently working on the site redesign for Big Spring United Methodist Church.
After finishing up work on the St. Ann's website (I wrote a customized Content Management System in ASP.NET MVC), I started working on a website for a (then) local church: Big Spring United Methodist Church. My work will be detailed on the blog as it happens, and in the portfolio when it's done.
Why Blog?
That is a damned good question. There are hundreds (if not thousands) of programmer blogs out there, each seeking to be different from the next. I've got something none of them have: me as a writer! Ok, so hubris aside, I blog because I can. Writing down what I'm doing allows me to revisit it later with an editor's eye, and determine if I'm drunk off of the kool-aid or if I'm heading in the right direction. I like to think that I am a writer who happens to know how to program.
A tertiary benefit (I've been wanting to use tertiary in a sentence all month!) of blogging is that the work I do gets out to the masses, and if I mess up, the denizens of the interweb will find me and take me to task for it; in my own backyard, as it were.
The Downside
Blogging exposes you to the world; and that means that any potential employer can do a minor amount of digging and find me (It isn't as if I can hide my whois information), and that could be a good or a bad thing. I just don't know. However, I think the benefits outweigh the risks, and here I stand, so to speak.
Contacting Me
So you want to contact me? I'm on Facebook, Twitter and Stack Overflow. If you want to contact me by e-mail, try George (at) yapb (dot) net.