Hello Folks!

Hi all, and welcome to my little blog. So, what am I hoping to accomplish with my little journal? Well, to get an idea on why, its best to give a detailed explanation of where I've been.

Last October, I was diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma, a cancer of the lymphatic system that only impacts about 7,500 people a year in the US. I can't get a winning night at the casinos, but I can catch a rare cancer. I think my lucky four leaf clover is actually poison ivy. Anyway, after eight months of chemotherapy and radiation therapy, I'm out on the other side cancer-free and ready to get back on with things. During this time, I kept a blog of the treatments and my reactions to them, and I actually enjoyed the process. So, I'm going to keep a personal journal for everyone to see, but relating to all topics, not just my cancer.

My blog description discusses family, technology, and all things Philadelphia. To be honest, that is probably a lie - I hate to say it, but a mid 30s married guy with two kids is NOT your go-to guy on the club scene on South Street, for example. However, I can rattle off a Top 5 cheesesteak joints in town with ease. Know your audience, people, know your audience.

As for family, I liked the ability of keeping my extended family up to date on what we've been up to: Vacations, kid's stuff, etc. So, I'll be sure to include a bit of that on the site. I'm not the biggest phone talker, so it allows me to let everyone know if one of the kids did something cool. Don't worry, this won't turn into the World Wide Web equivalent of the vacation slide show.

Finally, technology. As I mention in my profile, I work as a Solutions Architect with an insurance company in the Philly area. My area of focus is Informatics, or information processing engineering. In other words, the process of taking terabytes of data and making it useful for knowledge workers at a business. As part of this work, we're starting to include Microsoft's tools in this effort: SharePoint, PerformancePoint, and SQL Server Analysis Services / Reporting Services. I'm a definite noob to .NET, so most of my discussions and discoveries in the products will be old hat to a lot of developers, but the idea will be the same as my cancer blog: It might give a new developer to those products an idea of what's to come. Many blogs give you the latest and greatest on what's happening in the products - But you may as well present it in a foreign language if you're new to it.

Anyway, that's it from me for now. I hope to hear back from some of you, and let me know if there's anything you'd like to see different on the site!