Salvete, Omnes! Greetings, Everyone!
If you clicked the “About” page, you probably want to know something about this site, and the man behind it. Fair enough. Read on!
My name is Keith and I currently live in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I was born on the East Coast but my family moved to Minnesota when I was very young, so I’m practically a native.
I am someone with one foot firmly planted in the past and the other poised to set down in the future. What does this mean? I have great respect and admiration for the past (think religion, art, philosophy, culture) while at the same time I eagerly embrace the approaching future (think science, technology, medicine). I am syncretic by nature, and my love of past and future gives me a unique perspective on the present.
I am culturally, politically, and religiously conservative, and I am a gay man. No! This is not oxymoronic! But it does make life (and dating) interesting!
I am a Thomistic Aristotelian, or perhaps an Aristotelian Thomist. Either way, I think Aristotle got it mostly right, and Aquinas corrected what errors there were. “Recte quod est devium.”
I am an unabashed word nerd, with a fondness for most ancient and modern languages, though Latin will always hold a special place in my heart. Primus inter pares, as it were.
I graduated with a degree in Philosophy, and minored in History and Art History, but since graduating, I have worked almost exclusively in Technology. Most of that time spent at IBM, where, along with project management and software testing, I became fascinated in some of the disciplines of human-computer interaction (HCI): Information Architecture (IA), User Interface (UI), and User Experience (UX) (qv).
It should come as no surprise, therefore, that two years ago I switched to Apple, and bought a Mac Pro. Apple’s strong design aesthetic continues to inspire me, so much so that after leaving IBM in March 2010, I have begun to wonder what it would be like to work there.
I spent the first three weeks of April visiting a dear friend in Folsom, California. I can’t believe I’m actually typing these words, but despite my incredibly rational fear of earthquakes, I have decided that the next chapter of my life will be written in California! During my trip, I spent one whole day at the Monterey Bay Aquarium and when I drove up to San Francisco, I avoided the freeway and instead took the Pacific Coast Highway.
Well…what can I say? I wanted to stop every five feet to admire the amazing beauty that is the Pacific Northwest. My whole life I have said that the Pacific Northwest was one of the two most beautiful places on earth, the other being New Zealand. I never saw either place in person, only TV, but still I thought them beautiful. Now, I know first hand just how beautiful they are, and I wonder how I can live any place else?
So, that’s it in a (large) nutshell. Lover of the past and future. Language geek. Design and tech? Check! Thank you for visiting my site; I hope you find something to make you think or laugh…why not both?
Sylvaticus, May 23, 2010
