Musings of a technophile

Well I decided to add this page simply because if you are visiting my page for the first time, you probably have no idea who I am or what I do.

Computers and Work

My name is Buck ******** (no peeking ) and I am a fan of pretty much all things computers.  I’ve been working on computers for about eight years now professionally, although you could say I’ve been seriously in to them for about 15 years (more than half my life since I’m 27 years old) – if you want to count a insane dedication to video gaming as “seriously into computers” you could probably raise that to 22 years.  Right now my job title is Database/Network/System Administrator (yes, that’s the official title) and I also do some programming.

I started getting into “computers” back when I was just about five years old and my Dad bought my brother and I the original Nintendo Entertainment System.  I’d say I was hooked almost immediately, and within a few years I had over a hundred NES games (birthday parties were great for game collecting back then).  As I moved on through life I continued to tinker with many electronic gadgets – VCR’s, Camera’s, Computers.  I seem to have a knack for figuring out settings on things that I had never even looked at an instruction book for.

Well sure enough years later I got lucky and landed a job in the IT field.  With a lot of help from my boss turned mentor’s I learned how to do almost anything with computer hardware – from building to troubleshooting.  I also learned software troubleshooting skills to the point where I could diagnose most computer issues if I could just see one symptom of it.

From there I moved to another job and started learning ASP, then .NET (C# specifically).  After a few months of this I was promoted to another position due to my troubleshooting skills.  The new position was to debug and fix not just code but also database issues.  I learned a great deal about SQL from that – enough that I could administer a SQL Server if I wanted to.  The company I was with started having “complications” after a while though, and I decided it was time to move on.

I obtained a new job at a different company where I was the DBA, and immediately implemented SQL 2005, a clustered SQL master server and log shipping for redundancy.  A few months after that my boss left the company and I took over half of his role as well to become the Database/System/Network Admin.  All of this took place in eight years, but I couldn’t have done it without some excellent teaching and some EXTREMELY lucky breaks along the way.

Personal Life

So that’s my job life.  In my personal life, I met my wife Mariel during a church youth group mission trip to Cat Island in the Bahama’s.  We dated for about five years before finally tying the knot.  We quickly moved into an apartment and spent a year there before buying a condo house.  We lived there for a couple years as Mariel became pregnant with our first son, Ethan.  Shortly before Ethan was born though our house was destroyed by Hurricane Wilma in 2005.  After getting our belongings and moving them to a rental house, we had Ethan only a couple days later (some say the stress of the house being destroyed was enough to force Mariel into labor – who knows?)  We lived in the rental house for almost a year until our condo house was rebuilt – which we then promptly sold.  Mariel became pregnant with our second son Logan while we were in that rental house though, and after we moved to a different town and I started my current job, we had him just five months later.  We were staying in a rental house for another year at the time, but since work was about 45 minutes away, we decided to move to a new home and that is where we are now (lots of moving eh? )  A year or so after we moved into that house, Mariel became pregnant again (how does this keep happening…must be because our toothbrushes are so close to each other?) and soon we had our first girl, Madelyn Paige. Another year went by and we had our fourth child Kaden (no middle name yet). So now Ethan is four, Logan is three and Maddie is one. When I think about how fast they are growing up, it makes me kinda sad really. It was like yesterday that they were just a few pounds and I could hold them in on arm. Now I’m starting to have to heave Ethan up he’s getting so big . In any case, we are very thankful for everything that God has blessed us with.

Games and Anime

The last section of my life is in anime and video games.  I started gaming back when I was five years old with my Nintendo Entertainment System, and I continued to play console games till this very day.  I’m mostly interested in RPG and Adventure games, however I have been known to play almost any type of game – be it plane flying, car racing, dancing, puzzle or platform – if it’s a video game, you can bet that I want to play it.  In 1999 I started computer gaming with Quake II.  I didn’t have a video card so it was pure software rendering with a 133 Mhz machine on a 28.8 modem, but somehow I made it though.  When it came time for Quake III and UT 99 I bought a computer and went from being just a gamer to being an obsessed gamer.  I would pretty much stay up till 4 A.M. every day playing games, meaning that I was playing about 10 hours of games a day (sick eh?).  I did this for a couple years, getting extremely good at Unreal Tournament (my favorite game at the time – perhaps all time even though I don’t play it anymore).  I also went to a few gaming conventions in which I took second place at every one of them (yes – first place always alluded me lol).  At the same time, I started watching Anime.  I had a huge interest in Anime and began to download every single piece of Anime I could get my hands on. I helped start a couple Anime message boards and even went to a few conventions.  Now (years later) I have two huge DVD binders full of Anime serieses, and I’m collecting more everyday.  I don’t collect like I used to, and I’m not where near crazy about it like I was years ago, but I still find it relaxing to catch a good Anime.

Anyways – that’s pretty much the main jist about me.  My blog covers all of these topics so figured I would give you some insight as to my relation to them all.  If you have any question or comments at anytime you can email me at elementzero@omegaprojex.com.