Forged between coal and code.
Senior Software Engineer · Georgia · Appalachian roots · Remote
I design software systems, AI workflows, and the guardrails that keep both honest. My work starts where a cheerful demo usually stops: failure paths, ownership boundaries, and proof that survives contact with production.
- Practice
- Java · Node.js · Google Cloud Platform · Distributed systemsShipping production systems since 2014
- Also shipped
- TypeScript · Python · Next.js · SvelteKit · Gemini · Claude · Gemma · Cloud Run
I grew up in a coal-mining town in southwest Virginia and built my career in Georgia. That background left me suspicious of waste, fond of repair, and deeply interested in systems that explain themselves.
The rules are short on purpose.
Name the boundary.
A system becomes governable when ownership, input, and refusal conditions are explicit.
Save the SunMake failure visible.
Quiet fallback is how a defect earns seniority. Errors should arrive early and with evidence.
Metal Birds Feed
Judgment stays human.
Theme song: “I Build Things”
Twisted Game Songs
I’ve called “I Build Things” my theme song since the first time I heard it.
I design systems by hunting the failure first. If a thing can break, I assume it will, and I would rather find it before production does. Nothing irritates me more than shipping a “done” deployment and needing a hotfix an hour later. If I deployed it, the failure should already have been found, understood, and closed.
Claims should have receipts.
- Projects documented
- 21
- Currently active
- 15
- Recorded awards
- 3