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Here you can learn about who I am and what I do ... or at least the information I'm willing to make available to strangers ... and that information could be all lies! Ha ha! |
Executive summary
I am a married Canadian techno-geek Technical Documentation Manager with a lot of different experiences and knowledge. I am a member of Mensa. I have lots of hobbies and interests, but never enough time. My favourite colour is green.
What am I like as a person?
Whole-brained. People tend to define me as what they are not. I mean: technical people see my "soft" skills (creativity, writing, musical, artistic) and define me as a soft-skilled person. The artistic creative people I meet and interact with define me as technical, because I am capable of working with highly technical subjects. Whenever I take "left-brain-right-brain" tests, I always seem to score very close to or in the middle.
By my nature, I am resistant to being pigeon-holed. I'm proud of that. I don't want to be a "detail man" and I don't want to be a "big-picture" man. I want to be my own man.
I am dynamic-sometimes charming, often irreverent, sometimes a company man, sometimes the court jester. I have a sharp and penetrating sense of humour that garners as many laughs as black marks against my career. I change my own oil, write and perform songs, create short stories, write computer software as a hobby. In university and afterwards I had a hard time deciding on what to do with my life and, frankly, still do.
I understand that 2/3rds of all communication is listening and understanding, but I don't suffer fools ... which, I suppose, makes me judgemental.
Fiercely fiercely loyal to those I love and trust. Not very nice to know for those I've lost trust in.
Where I've lived
I was born and raised in North Vancouver, BC, Canada. I have always lived in the Lower Mainland (Greater Vancouver area) except for a few months in each of:
Where I got my education
I started out taking digital electronics and computer courses in Calgary in 1985 at the tender young age of eighteen. Not surprisingly (considering my age and my reasons for going to Calgary), it didn't pan out very well. So I returned to Vancouver and attended Simon Fraser University from 1986 until 1991; I was on my own personal Five Year Plan (the course of my university career went thus: "think I'll take some sciences ... now some arts ... some more sciences ... hmm ... some more arts ... hmm ... I have enough credits to graduate ... think I will ....")
Here is a list of some of the things I have studied over the years (in approximately the listed order):
What I do to pay my bills
I taught English as a Second Language for a few miserable under-employed and financially-challenged years, then got into the computer software industry as a VB Developer and Technical Writer. I dropped the development part of it because I have a pulse, but stuck with the Technical Writing part for several years. I am now the Manager of a Technical Documentation team (and process) and love my job.
In short (if that's possible), I am a Writer and a Teacher with technical skills and knowledge, and I Manage a team of similarly-minded smart people.
What I do for fun
Here is a list of things I like to do in my copious free time:
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