My (short) Story

San Bernardino, Utah

I grew up in San Bernardino in sunny southern California. I was actually born in Las Vegas. My father worked there as manager in a Thrifty Drug Store. My Mom probably talked him into taking a job in Vegas - she loved playing those machines. We moved back to California when I was about 8 Months old.
She took my brother and me back a couple of times when we were kids. Funny - about the only thing I remember is running up and down the stairs of the Mint where there were so many crickets.
My first band was in elementary school. We played for all the students, teachers and parents and were not bad I guess. We played some Beatles and some surf music like "Pipeline". Otherwise, there were several "garage-bands".
I married real young and soon moved to Utah with wife and son Steve. My daughter Melanie was born in Utah.
In Salt Lake City we had a band called Burlington Express. For a while I played in a country band which isn't necessarily my thing - but it's popular there.
In 1976 we moved back to San Bernardino.

Silicon Valley

In San Bernardino there wasn't much work to find. My friend Grey said he heard there was a lot happening up north so we drove up to San Jose with his VW beetle and 1 Styx cassette. We left our wives in San Bernardino until we found work and got settled. It was easy to find a job there. My first job in Silicon Valley was operating a saw that cut thin wafers from the silicon crystals. I had no idea what those were used for. When my wife came up to San Jose, she got a job soldering chips on boards for Apple's early computers.

A Trip turns permanent

Although I had a good and interesting job, I somehow realized that there's a world out there outside of the USA (alot of Americans don't realize that). I actually just planned a trip through Europe and Israel - but my 2nd wife that I met in Israel kind of mixed my plans up - permanently. That's how - after 7 months in Israel I ended up coming to Germany. I was thrilled to find out that Siemens in Munich used the good old Calma Systems that I worked on in Silicon Valley and they needed somebody to take care of them. I became their System Manager for Calmas.
Our daughter Livana, my third child, was born in 1984.

Allgaeu, Germany

When my company in Munich (not Siemens) merged with another company and cut back it's work force (including me), we moved to Allgaeu (pronounced: Algoi) near the Lake of Constance. Here I am still - enjoying life with Conni.