I am one of those 'Californians' you have probably heard gossip or rumors about. Truth be told, my wife and I were fed up with the Southern California lifestyle, and longed for a more balanced place with outdoor activities and good family values to raise our kids (now 3.5 and 1). We have friends up here from Colorado, Minnesota, and California that have moved here all within the last 5 years. We visited and camped frequently, and always knew SLC was a special place.

When my last high tech start up company went under in April of this year, we decided that was the catalyst to leave California after 5 years. I had a good offer to go work for Intel up in Portland, Oregon, but in the end, we knew that's not what we wanted. So we found a house in Bluffdale, sold our Southern California home and moved up jobless! Pretty big risk, but one we were willing to take.

I was off for about 6 months, 3 of that was just getting our new home in order, and recently started working at a local software company. If you ever see me down the 15 or Bangerder, give me a wave or a honk, and you will get one in return!

In the time I was off, I bought this from a local sheriff in Sandy that was going to Afghanistan (thoughts and prayers)-



Then, since I had time, I did this-