About Me

I grew up in Santa Cruz (CA) playing baseball, basketball, and skiing a lot, then moved to LA for 7 years while I did my BSME and MSME at UCLA. I’m no Kareem Abdul Jabaar, so I played on the UCLA Ultimate Frisbee team for 4 years, and was our deep cutter for a while. Since college, I’ve lived in Cordoba (Spain), Mendoza (Argentina), Huanchaco (Peru), Juayua (El Salvador), Belfast (Northern Ireland) and Santa Cruz, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Chicago (US). Although I’m losing my edge, I’m still fluent in Spanish after almost 3 years of living and traveling in the Spanish speaking world.

For work, I’ve kind of been all over the place. I’ve done electric motorcycle parts design, stress and NVH testing on heavy machinery, reliability/durability testing on the Tesla Model S, I’ve helped develop a biotech laboratory assistant robot, led ME efforts in the beer-tech scene, and led ME efforts for industrial pipe repair robots. Various water and sanitation volunteer work took me to Nicaragua and El Salvador for extended stays, where I helped develop basic water catchment and delivery systems for rural farming communities. Check out my CV or Portfolio page for some more details on my work experience. From a service standpoint, I spent about a year as a shift manager in a restaurant in SF during the recession, a UCLA bus driver, and also two years of schlepping fish in a seafood market in high school.

Homebrewing is a big hobby of mine. I recently had 10 full carboys fermenting 5 different styles for a few weddings. I made a watermelon hef, double nut brown ale, barrel aged scotch ale, coffee oatmeal stout, and a double IPA. I like to brew darker ales. I suppose I prefer drinking them too, but there’s a time and a place for any style, and my tastes are constantly changing. Except for Habanero Stout. Save those peppers for the burritos. In a brewery, behind the grill, or watching pots boil, I love using heat to make stuff delicious.

I have a lot of hobbies. Playing sports and skiing are my favorite pastimes. I also like to tinker and have rebuilt a few car engines, bicycles, and woodworking machines. I also enjoy abalone diving, crabbing, spearfishing, and clamming on the cold Northern California Coast. I really like camping, and one time hiked 400 km on an 18 day journey through the Sierra Nevadas.

I’m 35, have 2 sisters, and a pretty big extended family. On personal level, I value honesty, kindness, and intimacy. I try to incorporate these values within my friendly, familial, professional, romantic, and canine relationships, because I believe that time well spent in good company is as good as it gets.

Travel

I really enjoy traveling, in any sense of the word. I like to explore the hill behind my house, but I’m also excited to fly across the world to explore some other hill. I’ve been to 34 countries and lived in 6, but who’s counting anyway? I’ve got an old travel blog that I haven’t updated in years. Maybe one day, I’ll port it over to this site.

Here is a gallery of some photos I’ve taken.