About Me

I’ve been making websites since before the dawn of YouTube, back when we were all really excited about XHTML (IYKYK). We didn’t have build tools; we just wrote HTML and threw it into the cPanel with a whispered prayer. If we wanted to template our markup we used a handy system called “lots of text documents with copy and paste”. I’ve worked solo, in corporate IT departments, as a contractor, and for startups. I could tell you about all the languages, tech stacks, databases, and frameworks I’ve used, but actually the most important things are I know are things you have to learn the hard way: By working with difficult people (and, in the early days, being a difficult person), solving unsolveable problems, making mistakes, building on top of them, and trying to help other people avoid them.

Oh, and shipping code to customers. Code you have to support and maintain because if you don’t, the business loses money.

When I’m not writing code or writing about code, I write short stories and novels. Most recently, I published Beneath the Trees, a short novel about a hidden world decaying at its roots. I also published seven short stories about the same immortal Unnamed Heroine in serial on this site. You can read them for free in the archive or download the full collection of them as an ebook over at the bookstore.

Otherwise, I spend most of my spare time with my wife Sally, who designs wedding dresses and creates other freelance art, and our son Björn. I like music, fiction reading, and mixing cocktails---or preferably all three at once, enjoyed at our home in Northern Indiana.