To understand some of my statements, basic familiarity with my background might be helpful:

• I am a 30-something old (I'd be more precise, but that would require annual updates to this page)
• I live in Seattle, WA. Pages on this site dated 2008 or earlier were written while I was living in Nashua, NH.
• I grew up primarily in Russia, and soon after I got out of college, I moved to the U.S.
• The girl named Sophia I mention once in a while is my daughter.
• I make my living as a software engineer/computer programmer.