Interests and Hobbies

Interests

  • Linux - I started using Linux as my main operating system in 2000 because of my dad’s influence. Over the years, as he has become a big advocate of GNU/Linux and free/open source software, so have I. I’ve gone through Mandrake, SuSE, Debian, and am now using Ubuntu Linux.
  • Ruby - This language is so pretty and clean, I can’t help but love it. It appeals to the designer side of me because its minimalist syntax leads to very neat and easy to read code. It has also been powerful enough to do everything I’ve had cause to try with it.
  • politics - I tend to be liberal in my political leanings, but people on both sides of the spectrum bother me. On specific issues, my beliefs include:
    • gun supporter
    • abortion supporter
    • capital punishment supporter
    • supporter of the separation of church and state
    • supporter of the teaching of evolution but not intelligent design
    • supporter of using open source standards in government, as opposed to closed, proprietary alternatives
  • Christianity - While I wasn’t raised to follow any particular religion, I grew up in the Bible Belt part of America, so Christianity has still been part of my life. Over the years, I’ve grown from having a great dislike of the religion in my angsty teen years to an interest in it currently. I’m reading through the New International translation of the bible and plan to read The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins afterward, for comparison.
  • languages - Foreign languages and accents fascinate me. I love trying to learn new languages, but I’m so fickle I never fully master one. To date, I’ve studied to varying degrees Spanish, German, and Russian. I’m furthest along in Spanish, which I’ve found to be a very pretty and logical language.

Hobbies

  • reading - I enjoy science fiction and horror novels, as well as comics, specifically Calvin and Hobbes and The Far Side. Two authors that I would love to meet are Orson Scott Card, author of my favorite book Ender’s Game, and Bill Watterson, author of my favorite comic book series, Calvin and Hobbes.
  • target shooting - Growing up in the southern United States in a rural area inevitably leads to some involvement in firearms. My family had guns when I was growing up and my parents, rather than hide them from my brother and I in hopes that we would not injure ourselves (security through obscurity is bad), instead taught us about their dangers and how to use them properly. When I became friends with the man who is now my boyfriend, one of our hobbies was to go target shooting together. He eventually bought me a Glock 22 .40 pistol as a gift; it’s my baby.
  • programming - Dude, I’m a computer science major—this is what we do. My introduction to programming came in the form of PHP when I was looking for an easier way to maintain my personal site. I moved on to MySQL so that I could better implement a fan site I wanted to create, then I learned C++ when I came to college. I’ve since also picked up skills in Perl and Ruby, the latter of which is my favorite language.
  • web design - This is my absolute favorite hobby; I live and breathe a combination of HTML, CSS, and Javascript. My ideal career would allow me to do that and get paid for it, plus a little graphics design for good measure.
  • graphics design - I enjoy working with photos that I’ve taken and I use The GIMP, Adobe Photoshop, and Adobe Illustrator, typically, to create my images. I most often have a cause to create graphics for use in a web site, either mine or one belonging to a client.
  • photography - Ever since my dad bought a digital camera when I was in high school, I have enjoyed taking photos. I eventually received a Canon PowerShot A520 as a Christmas gift one year, and the number of photos I take, along with the frequency with which I take them, increased dramatically. I store my best photos as well as snapshots of friends and family in my Flickr account.