Contact

Background

I am a graduate of the Alberta College of Art and Design (now Alberta University of the Arts) Bachelor of Fine Arts program. I am also a graduate of the Athabasca University Master of Arts in Integraged Studies (MAIS) program, and a B.Sc.(Eng.) graduate of the University of Alberta.

I've often wondered what became of many of my engineering classmates but I have heard from a few of them. Curtis Sparrow is a businessman and consul for Costa Rica. Brian Zerb is senior project manager for zed.i solutions. "Crazy" Kernighan is taking a long-term vacation in Mexico. Ernie Romanow is a hiking guide in British Columbia. Charles Lang is with Telus. If any of the rest of you are out there, let me know!

Before that, I attended Archbishop O'Leary High School in Edmonton. I've kept in (occasional) touch with Tim Black who is a technical writer, Ihor Gowda who is now a playwright/author and musician manager/agent in Texas, and Dante Scanga who is a doctor in Edmonton.

As you can tell, I love glassblowing. I play hockey year round and have coached soccer.

Lorie is the love of my life. She is a B.Ed. graduate of the University of Alberta and she also attended Archbishop O'Leary High School. She is a retired teacher of English as a Second Language, and enjoys ceramics and gardening. Our two children, David and Lisamarie, live on their own in Calgary.

A few of my favorite quotes:

  • "We trained hard ... but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up in teams we would be reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing; and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization." - Petronius Arbiter (circa A.D. 60)
  • "A well-structured web site is like a quiet, comfortable cafe; most, unfortunately, have more in common with reform school cafeterias."  - Gregory V. Wilson No Engineers Were Harmed in the Production of this Book, Dr. Dobb's Journal (November 1998)
  • "I have no trouble with schizophrenia. I understand that people get sick. I got no problem with that. I just wanna know one thing. How come the voices in their heads always say 'Kill your mo-th-err...kill them aaalll...'? How come they never say 'Get a jooobbb...'?" - unnamed New York City detective in an article by Patricia Pearson Death Becomes Her, Saturday Night (December 1998)
  • "But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown." - Carl Sagan
  • Don't be lulled into a sense of false security by management's oft-stated interest in getting feedback. There are only two safe things to say to a manager: "Your decisions are brilliant!"; "I have an idea on how to save some paper!" - Scott Adams The Dilbert Principle (1997) p. 84
  • Managers are like cats in a litter box. They instinctively shuffle things around to conceal what they've done. - Scott Adams The Dilbert Principle (1997) p. 270
  • Leaders are people who can pursue a path that is seemingly nonsensical or even dangerous to everybody else. Common sense tells us that nobody needs a leader to take the path that's intuitive; people would do that on their own. Therefore, since the leader recommends a path that is seemingly illogical to the "average" person, we can conclude that a leader must be either: 1. So smart that nobody can share the vision ...Or... 2. A nitwit. - Scott Adams The Dilbert Principle (1997) p. 290
  • ... and if you're in I.T., you may like Top 50 Programming Quotes of All Time, posted by jun auza

© Copyright 2002-2022 R. Kaltenbach