Ok, so I kept the Old Site up for entirely too long. I'm working on a new site now. This time I'm using modern HTML and some actual CSS. My goal is to make this a little more flashy, but to keep it able to degrade nicely. There are studies out there that show black text on a white background to be easiest to read (seen a newspaper, book, or magazine recently?), so that's what I'm sticking with, though. None the less, you'll want a standards-compliant browser to get the full show here. I'm using a doctype and code (XHTML 1.0 strict) to keep browsers in standards mode, but I'm not big on the stupid CSS hacks that are required to make IE behave like it should (even in standards mode).

The main reason I've finally gotten off my duff to update the site? The firm that's employed me for the last 5 years has decided that they don't need a sysadmin any longer. I've gotten everything in pretty good shape, and it does mostly run itself with minimal intervention (I'm the only sysadmin). That's because I do a good job, and continue to innovate when possible, not because I'm redundant. Obviously, I think it's a bad business decision to let me go, but it's not up to me. I'm sure that the others who were let go think it's a poor decision to let them go - and I'm probably not being totally objective here. I hate to go, as I honestly consider the people I work with to be more of an extended family than just people I see most weekdays. I will genuinely miss each and every one of them. Regardless, the firm's loss is potentially someone else's gain.

My resume is online - in both out-of-date HTML and plain text formats. If you think there's even a chance that you could use a skilled Linux admin (Windows and Mac OS aren't beyond my reach, nor are other *nix platforms) who's familiar with building a complete corporate network from the ground up and who is extremely proficient in perl (with strong PHP and Java skills, as well as an inclination to learn other languages), email me. Even if I haven't done something before, I can learn how to do it, and I can learn it quickly. I'm always working on new projects (right now I'm learning PIC Micro assembly code, and have written some stuff to work with iButtons - it'll be up here for download when it's a little more polished). Anyway, I'll need a few days to get things at work cleaned up for my departure. I know they'll need some good documentation eventually, and I don't want my friends to suffer because of the decision to let the only sysadmin go. Otherwise, they officially "don't need me", so I'm available within a couple of weeks. I'm open to relocating most anywhere for the right position, though I'm hoping to stay within a day's drive (14 hours or so) of central IL if possible.