Here's the typical, obligatory page where I'm supposed to yak about myself.

Your benevolent web-tyrant was born in St. Louis, Missouri on January 30th, 1970.  Mohandas Gandhi was assassinated on the day I was born.  Frank Sinatra shared my birthday as well.  The Beatles broke up that year.  Monday Night Football began, and Chuck Manson was sent to the big house, permanently, for being a crazy asshole with a swastika on his forehead.

I come from a broken home.  My parents are polar opposites, and to this day I still don't see what the hell my mom saw in my father.  He never physically abused me, but he abused her.  Not like Ike Turner or anything, but let's just say that he loved his Falstaff beer more than he loved her.  He went to Vietnam, but I truly don't think he came back "all fucked up" like a lot of other veterans like to blame their miserable lives on.  Like Che Guevara, my mother and I revolted in the family unit, and we threw his punk ass out sometime around '81.  I was only 11, but still smart enough to know that dad was a royal dick.  We were part of that great pioneering movement of broken home families, except that I'm not going to sue my parents for my shortcomings, or blame them for how I turned out.  The picture at the right, is that of my mother.  She deserves her props for busting her ass for years, without any help from my jackhole father, and single-handedly raising one of the remaining decent kids in the world.  She pushed all the right buttons, didn't become one of these crackhead single mothers, sacrificed way more than she should have, and is an all-out good person...I'm not bullshitting you.

I was sentenced to Catholic grade school when I was six.  The same school that my mother was condemned to, when she was a child.  'Twas a small school run by the cold, iron fist of catholic school nuns, and their little toadie priests.    The Warden...err...Principal, for my 8-year sentence was Sister Marie Ambrose, a sadistic, imposing tyrant of a woman who seemed to take just a little too much pleasure in her work...particularly in doling out punishment to her subjects.  For this, I'm sure that when she takes her eternal dirt-nap (if she hasn't already), God will surely have a few angry questions to ask that bitch, about her time spent here.  Hell, he might even escort that hag to the elevator that only goes down.
          My time in that building was pretty uneventful, except for being wrongfully accused of changing grades in one of the teachers' grade books.  My crime was that I knew who did it, but wouldn't snitch on them.  Little did I know, that was a sign of the impending times to come, for me.

As if 8 years weren't enough, I stupidly followed most of my friends to a Catholic high school, nearby.  This prison wasn't run by nuns.  Worse yet, it was governed by, what the Roman Catholic religion describes as "Brothers."  Brothers are not "good enough" to be priests, but holy enough to have their own little sect in the Roman Catholic hierarchy.  Basically...they're male nuns.  I spent 4 years at that prison.  How I survived, I don't know.  I got straight "F's" in anything relating to math, but got straight "A's" in drama and art.  Because of this, I swore never to work in an "office" environment, with my face buried in a little cube, like a veal, in a meat processing plant.  I was gonna be one of those pompous, brooding, artsy assholes who hug trees, listen to Morrissey, dress like Robert Smith of "The Cure," and bitch about the current president, no matter what political party he worshipped.  Ever notice how people who dress like Robert Smith, or any of those other assholes, only want to be known as "not being like everyone else," when in actuality they're so tragically common, they don't know it?  It is to laugh.

Being thrown out into the real world, I discovered my total detest for formal, structured schooling.  I did go to college, but never really graduated with anything.  Technically, I'm about 6 credits away from a degree in Criminal Justice, 10 credits away from a degree in psychology, and for a couple brief spells, I tried degrees in graphic design and general art and design.  So basically, I know a lot of shit, but I don't have anything to show for it.  It was at this time, I discovered that I have a serious problem with ADD ("attention deficit disorder," for you government-schooled idiots who don't know what that is).  After I figured that stuff out, and tamed the beast, I started absorbing information like a sponge.  I learned more shit from the History Channel, than I ever did at high school.  Recently, I've self-taught myself to be quite proficient in the Microsoft Visual Basic programming language, and I'm now working to conquer PS/SQL, Oracle 10g Database.  Not bad for someone who had to go to summer school (twice) for algebra and basic math.

I worked all those shit jobs that every other person did, in their late teens and early 20's.  Fast food, gas stations, etc.  Six years were spent at Walgreens, which were six dismal years (Dear Mr. Benning...blow me.  Love Boog).  Recently, I finished up nine years at a St. Louis-based construction company.  It was nice, but it did cause me to suffer a nervous breakdown, and put me on Prozac...so I have that going for me.

I last worked at an information technology company as an Applications Engineer.  I feel that I was kinda thrown into that position, because I had some niche skills at my previous job.  My actual knowledge of information technology is really pretty limited, and after a while it started to show.

The last thing my former boss told me, as I was laid off was, "You've got some good skills.  You shouldn't have any problem finding a new job."  Wow.  What a liar HE was.

Finding a job in St. Louis, right now, is a MONUMENTAL task.  Dozens and dozens of resumes.  Dozens and dozens of job applications.  Months' worth of pouring over newspapers, online career sites, and want ads.  The constant wondering why no one was calling.  It is so easy to become terribly depressed when in this state.

That's when I realized that NOW is the time to pursue a completely new career.  I'm getting the fuck out of the I.T. field.  That kind of overwhelming stress is not for me.  As I said earlier, in this diatribe, I never wanted to be in an office environment, stuck in a little veal cube...I guess I should have stuck with my gut feeling there, all along.