I'm an I.S. (Information Systems) professional living in the Portland, OR area. I'm originally from the state of Louisiana, but I also lived in South Carolina for almost 10 years as well as in Washington for over 9 years. Until March/April 1999, I never considered moving to the Pacific Northwest (or possibly even knowing where Seattle, WA was) until the company I worked for in Louisiana went Chapter 7 and I ended up working for a Redmond, WA area consulting firm on a contract assignment with the Visual Basic product group at Microsoft Corporation. I also never thought I would move again until a personal relationship began with a dear friend who eventually became my wife (and resulted in me moving from Washington to Oregon). These days one of my technology passions is Microsoft SQL Server. While at LSU (Louisiana State University), I really never wanted to have anything to do with databases, but I got talked into taking 'Introduction to Database Systems'. After I got a job at a major company, I noticed how important databases were. Ever since 1997, every job I've had has had something to do with databases - most specifically Microsoft SQL Server. While the certification exams may have gone into retirement, I have taken and passed the following Microsoft exams: Windows 2000 Server, SQL Server 2000 Administration, and Managing a Windows 2000 Network Environment. Besides databases, I've done software development - mostly in Visual Basic or ASP (Active Server Pages) as well as T-SQL (Transact-SQL). Since we now live in the world of .NET (aka the Microsoft .NET Framework), all the programming that I try to do at work and at home is in C# (including ASP.NET 2.0 - and now with Ajax). I also have begun working with SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services and enjoy creating SSRS reports. While I've been around computers most of my life (since my dad worked in the I.T. industry for over 30 years), computers are more for my professional life/career (unless I'm working on my website, checking email, or surfing the web) and my friends and my hobbies (cycling, running, bowling, snowboarding, rollerblading, boating, hiking, and photography) are what I enjoy the most and I try to spend my "free" time doing one of my hobbies that I share with them or trying something new. As seen on the front page of my website and on the "Racing" pages on the Cycling tab, I expanded my hobby as a cyclist in July 2005 to include at first track racing at the Group Health Velodrome in Marymoor Park and later time trials. While I'm still trying to adapt to racing and find the strength and speed I need to succeed, racing has been a fun but hard (and at times frustrating or really enjoyable) activity. I joined Team Zoka in October 2005 (which became Team Cucina Fresca for the 2008 season). While they were a great team to be a member of, I parted with them when I moved to Oregon and now am a member of Team Oregon. Here's my current race categories and team associations: Category Road Racing: 4 (promoted from Cat. 5 in May 2007) Track Racing: 4 (promoted from Cat. 5 in August 2007) Club/Team Associations 2005: Independent/No Team (joined Seattle SuperSquadra/Team Zoka in Oct. 2005) 2006: Seattle SuperSquadra/Team Zoka 2007: Seattle SuperSquadra/Team Zoka-Cucina Fresca 2008: Seattle SuperSquadra/Team Cucina Fresca | Team Oregon (August-December 2008) 2009: Team Oregon 2010: Team Oregon