About me - The short version
I am married with a 13 month old son, and two cats. We happily reside in the quiet village of Manchester, MI, Home of The World Famous Chicken Broil
. I have a B.S. degree (Psychology), but have been a chef for most of my working life. When I'm not working, or chasing a toddler, you'll usually find me watching a movie, or in front of the computer.
Too short? Well, what do you want to know about?
About me - The long version
Family
My wife, Tessa, and I met sometime in 1996 while attending Alma College. She was a Theatre major, and I had yet to decide on biology psychology. We started dating in 1999, and were married October 1st, 2004. We spent our honeymoon in France, splitting time between Paris and Nice. I currently work at North Point Seafood & Steakhouse in Dexter, and Tessa works for PRTC, in Chelsea.
On August 10th, 2007, we became parents. Our son Carter has changed our lives in unimaginable ways, including giving me an excuse to play with Legos.
Cooking
Cooking has always been a big part of my life. Even when I wasn't working in restaurants I would dabble in the kitchen. My culinary philosophy is actually quite simple, I prefer unpretentious foods done well, and homemade is best. I am probably best known for my sauces and soups, and I pride myself on being a self-taught saucier.
I have had quite a few people ask me who my favorite chef is. They usually mean Food Network personality, which would be Alton Brown. My favorite chef... well, I don't have one. However, I am fond of Brian Polcyn's food over at Five Lakes Grill.
Hobbies & Interests
Movies
We watch a lot of movies. Some of my favorites include: Grosse Pointe Blank, Better Off Dead, Fight Club, and Ratatouille. At one point Netflix was shipping our movies from Alaska to try and slow down our usage, seriously.
Web design
I created my first site over ten years ago, and yes, I used tables. I have been dabbling online since the bbs days, and was an early user of both CompuServe and AOL.
About two years ago I coded my own blog script using PHP, but later switched to Wordpress when I couldn't devote the time to maintaining or upgrading the code. We mostly use our site to keep family up to date on how our son, Carter, is doing, and as a playground for my web design hobby. I have only recently begun to consider web standards when writing webpages, and decided to take a web coding course in order to learn proper coding practices.
Camping
The first time I went camping I was 20 years old, I never even knew what I was missing. We don't get to go much anymore, in fact we haven't gone camping in over two years. However, when we do go, I enjoy less populated areas preferably near a body of water. Some of my camping highlights include a weekend on South Manitou Island, and a hike-in weekend on the Kalamazoo River. We usually camp in Manistee National Forest along the Lake Michigan coast.