I was born in Virginia, just outside of Washington D.C. and moved to Fort Wayne with my family when I was about two years old. This move was prompted by a change from Appalachian Power to Indiana Michigan power in my father's job position.
From there (skipping the boring childhood and adolescent crap), I ended up at Concordia High School. By this time, I was playing guitar in two bands, delving somewhat into industrial/electronic music, an avid fan of Death, Carcass, Sepultura and Godflesh and had met Al Quandt during his short duration there.
I graduated with the class of '97 and proceeded to Indiana University in Bloomington (upon realizing that University of California Berkley was roughly $17,000 per semester out of state, which resulted in deciding against going there).
Partway into my freshman year as a biology major (completely unprepared for the college experience by the lame attempt at education that was Concordia), I found out that my father was taking severence from Indiana Michigan Power and that income to support my college education might not be there as I had always (blindly) assumed. At that point, I spent the rest of my freshman year partying as hard as possible since I had figured it to be the entirety of my college career.
My time as a college drop out was spent between working in gas stations, telemarketing, random road trips to Detroit, Chicago, Indianapolis, Toledo, Columbus, Bloomington, Terre Haute and Washington D.C. along with flights to San Fransico, Los Angeles, Oahu and Maui.
This correlated to the time that Al (Kimaliz), Carl (Pleasing Melani), Nate (analogtrack), Matt (hewbrew*hatecore) and company were living at "the house" in Indian Village. When not going to concerts on the several road trips, I often went to "the house" to party, socialize and play music.
A friend from IU who was a graduate student at the time made me an offer to take over his lease in Bloomington and told me more about financial aid, since I was then 23 years old and could be considered an independent student. Seeing the chance to continue my education, I took the offer and moved back to Bloomington in January of 2001.
A friend from Terre Haute who had also been in my dorm freshman year split the townhouse with me as we both worked temporary jobs, complimenting the income with becoming subjects for IU psychology department experiments. I enrolled back in school that summer and took on a psychology minor along with the biology major.
I stayed in contact with friends in Fort Wayne and booked bands at Sunset Reception Hall (such as Objective Reality, Oguns Will and MindFluxFuneral) for a short time from a distance while also playing in an aggro metal band in Indy. I also started taking Betta spendins, Siamese Fighting Fish, as aquarium pets that summer.
Fall of 2001 through Winter of 2003 were a blur between part-time classes, telemarketing for Indiana University Foundation Telefund, working gas stations in Fort Wayne over Christmas and Summer vacations and late night drives to and from Ball State to see the girl whom I was dating at the time. After she suffered from an accident, the relationship ended and I found myself to be consistantly not sleeping at night, as usual, but also not sleeping during the day or evening. Until April of 2004 I had a stint of insomnia where I got back into drinking, playing a lot of video games, music and got back into skateboarding. I dedicated my studies to psychology, dropping the biology major and picking up outside concentrations in geology and anthropology. By the end of the academic year, I had been to clinicians and medical doctors, been diagnosed with insomnia and began a prescription to tame my sleeping patterns.
I finished the semester and decided to give myself a break from Bloomington, returning to Fort Wayne for the summer with intentions of skateboarding, spending time with friends and family, working at the old gas station and getting back into the music scene. Al and Matt had Fort Wayne Starving Artists' Coalition in full swing at this time while both had their respective bands (Severence and Sealing Pandora). Between going to shows and helping carry equipment, I made time for late night coffee at IHOP, where I met Renee.
Somewhere in that summer, I made time to meet Lacuna Coil and play with the 17 year Brood X Cicadas in B-town as well.
I returned to Bloomington in the Fall to my aquaria...
...and brought along an extra guest, Mink, Renee's youngest pet rat. Mink just happens to love music equipment along with a Jack & Coke too.
Due to my Hautian roommate making plans to move elsewhere with his fiance and get married over the summer, the decision was made to not resign the lease in 2005. Upon this prompt I took the remainder of the classes that I was intending to take during my duration at Indiana University, including cultural anthropology, bioanthropology, experimental methods in psychology and sensation/perception. I completed the academic year and my baccalaureate degree in psychology from Indiana University in May of 2005.
I returned to Fort Wayne with the intention of continuing my studies in psychology and anthropology at IPFW, temporarily working at the gas station until something better could be found, and rejoining my friends in the local music scene. I am currently a half-time student and senior at Indiana University/Purdue University Fort Wayne, a full-time mental health assistant at Parkview Hospital's Behavioral Health unit (formerly Charter Beacon) and still try to remain active in the music scene (moderating FWM.com, stage managing the October FWM Showcase, assisting with Built to Shine Arts Collective events and frequenting shows when time allows).
AIM = Grindspine
ICQ = 92954686
Yahoo = Grindnark
http://www.myspace.com/grindspine
http://www.livejournal.com/~grindspine
I am also a senior member on Harmony-Central's forums,
http://acapella.harmony-central.com/forums/index.php?s=
a moderator on egameaddiction's forums,
http://www.egameaddiction.com/forums/index.php
a sometimes active member on the Avalanche Co. forums,
http://p080.ezboard.com/favalancheincboardfrm3
and, previously mentioned, a moderator here on Fort Wayne music.com,
http://www.fortwaynemusic.com/boards.new/index.php
edit: Removed link to IU homepage. My IU accounts finally went inactive since I am not attending... (Like, duh, since I already have a degree from there... Of course, the cancellation of my IU accounts was the one e-mail not forwarded to me through my fornicatin' IPFW account... bah!)
