Light Bio

Hey. I'm Mike. Yet another getting to be old-timey gen-Xer nerd online. By day I'm a control systems "engineer" and by night, mainly just tired.

My offical work title is "Senior Automation Specialist". I mainly work with Distributed Control Systems or DCS'. Primarily Honeywell Experion, but I originally learned on an older Metso DNA system, and have also done some work with Foxboro I/A and some older Honeywell TDC. I do work with PLCs as well, mainly Rockwell Control Logix and some of their older flavors. The vast majority of my professional experience is in and around the paper towel and toilet paper manufacturing business.

Personally I'm a pretty easy going dude interested in a lot of stuff. Is it ADHD? Quite possibly. I have a wonderful wife and an adult son. Three dogs and a cat that are shedding way too much at the time I'm writing this. Music (listening), food (cooking or eating), movies/shows (usually watching, not sleeping), programming (well, trying to), and just hanging out with my wife (so lovely) are what I'm doing most of the time when I'm not working. Oh, and since Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom came out recently, there is a good bit of playing that right now too.

I have been working for over 25 years in tissue/towel manufacturing facilities. I started out as an Operations Tech. After a handful of years driving fork trucks and operating equipment, I joined the Electrical & Instrumentation group. I did on-shift support, planning, and projects over the next several years with a growing focus on controls and automation.

For a while I was a Maintenance leader for a group of over 20 mechanics and electricians, overseeing day to day activites and the M&R budget. I've also been a Site Cyber Security Leader as well as a Site PM Leader. I have participated in a wide variety of projects over the years usually in a technical role focusing on the electrical and controls aspects of the job, but in many cases acting as the PM as well.

For the past 8+ years, I've been working as a consultant/engineer with the vast majority of my time spent doing brownfield migration work and systems upgrades for clients.

Doing controls and automation work professionally is a good fit for me, because most of my hobby-time is spent playing around with programming and tech gadgets. I started playing around with computers and programming when I was around 9 or 10 years old. My dad had gotten a Commodore 64 from a guy he worked with along with a stack of computer magazines. And that was it, I was hooked. Unfortunately I, with my academics and financials as they were, wound up not parlyaing that interest into higher education and a career in programming. So while I've been dabbling with a wide variety of programming languages over the years, I still feel very much a rookie hobbyist most of the time. But I enjoy it, and that's what's important.

I'm an avid music fan and listen to a wide range of genres. If you're curious about what I dig, you can check out my last.fm page.

I like to cook and bake a bit. I really need to digitize and organize my recipes for quicker finding and access. Debating on how I want to do this. I may create a recipe template and just make a recipe section for the site here.

Alright, I don't know where I'm going with this here. Let's wrap this up for now. I was born and raised in Northeast Pennsylvania. I lived out in Southern California for several years. And I've now been in the Upstate of South Carolina for over 8 years.

Happy Travels.