About Me

Since you are reading this page, why don't I tell you something about me?  I grew up in an isolated spot in Northern Utah, the oldest of five children.  Left to myself, I soon became interested in animals, dinosaurs, art, astronomy, mythology, literature, physics, history, philosophy, knowledge representation theory, psychology, machine learning, linguistics, computer science, and then literature and art again—in that order.  In the middle of that chain of nerdy exploration, I earned a few degrees at local universities including a Ph.D. in computer science (involving information extraction, data mining, and natural language processing) at Brigham Young University.  I also met and married Megan.  Together we have five children.  I currently work as a data scientist in the advertising technology industry.

My primary passions now, aside from my family, my religion, and earning a living as a data scientist, are (1) writing, (2) art, and (3) data science applied to writing and publishing.  This blog will be a testing ground for all three topics as I prepare to write two books: "Keys of the Kingdom" and "The Mystery of East and West".  There is an interesting relationship between the two books.  They are not exactly sequels.  Rather "Keys of the Kingdom" exists inside "The Mystery of East and West".  You will have to wait for the books to come out to understand what I mean.  The theme of both books and this blog is the "Path of Life".  Throughout history, literature, and art, the "Path of Life" has been associated with the dichotomy of East and West in interesting ways.  I hope to add some light to this most ancient symbol throughout the blog and the two books.

Speaking of paths to the East, here is a picture of me in my most easterly travels: