--Han Solo
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Innocent Noise
I live in the southern tip of Texas, also known as the Rio Grande Valley. I was born and raised here, but did spend a few years in the "big city" of Houston as a PC Technician. After that, I spent four glamorous years in the U.S. Navy, where I was stationed in such varied continental locales as Great Lakes, IL, Charleston, SC, and San Diego, CA. Now I'm back in the Valley, working as a Network Administrator and Sales Associate for Simply Sites RGV.
Obviously, I have a great deal of interest in PC's. But unlike the myriad of hackers and crackers out there, I have virtually no interest in programming. However, I absolutely love hardware, and to some extent, networking. My last PC, which was my fifth personal build, died over the 2006 Christmas Holidays. Luckily for me, I was able to come up with the cash to build a new one.....during the 1-month interim, I was forced to use my laptop....."how horrid," as C-3PO would say! My current PC is the sixth computer that I've built for myself, but if I'd had more money, it would be like my 25th or something, LOL. I couldn't possibly count the number of PC's that I've built for friends, coworkers, and family, but I'd have to number it around 200 (spend a few years as a PC Technician and you'll do a lot of upgrading, fixing, building, and re-building, haha).
In addition to building computers, I also have a passion for cooking. There's hardly anything more enjoyable than creating a feast of culinary delights, then sharing them with friends and family. As an extension to cooking, I have a great interest in using the freshest ingredients; so to complement my recipes, I started growing my own herbs in 2003. I started with only three herbs--Parsley, Basil, and Dill, then added Bell Peppers two months later. In 2005, I attempted to expand my outdoor garden, but the formidable heat of South Texas quashed my dreams by early May, leaving me only with the chile peppers and other herbs that do well in high-heat environments. For a full 'side-line' shakedown, see my Garden page. Please note that my Garden page is a few years old; I haven't made any significant updates to it.
Besides cooking and gardening, which are recent hobbies/interests (at least in the last ten years or so), I've always enjoyed movies. For a couple of periods between 1996-1999, I worked at Blockbuster Video, and used my employee benefits to their fullest, watching as many movies as I possibly could. I don't know the actual number of movies I've seen in my life (who does?), but it definitely numbers in the thousands, probably close to 3500. My personal DVD collection has recently surpassed 300, and they are movies which I have purchased on my own....those which I consider are greats, or those that I have purchased based on their great marketing. I'd have to admit that a few of my movies are craptacular, but I have to reaffirm that those were purchased due to their marketing; I had not previously seen them. Although I have my own grading system of 1 to 5 points for movies, I have not included that data on my Movies page. I prefer to respect others' opinions, allowing them to make their own judgments....after all, do you really give a rat's ass what I think about a particular movie? I don't think so, although I will write brief reviews on the Home page, once in a while.
Aside from PC's, cooking, gardening, and movies, I also enjoy the outdoors. Hiking and fishing are of special interest--my Dad is big into fishing, so that has kind of filtered down to me. I'm not the big-time fisherman that he is, but I do enjoy fresh-water fishing with spinners, and salt-water fishing with corks and artificial shrimp/worms. More enjoyable for me, however, is the thrill of capturing "Kodak moments" with my camera, while he or my friends are in the midst of reeling in "the big one."
Also, I spent most of Summer 2005 scanning old family photos, and capturing videos of my time in the Navy and while on leave. It took a long time, but I finally finished scanning the photos, and was able to produce a nice slideshow DVD that we all watched when my cousins (the Wetli's) from California came to visit in July. I've finished editing nearly all of the family-oriented videos, but I've still got the Navy videos to work on. When finished, I'll have some great DVD's to send to all of you; I'll let you know when they're done, and I'll mail the discs to you then.
In the meantime, I bid you "fair winds and following seas."
-Bryan
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--Christopher Columbus
