I took a web development class and mostly taught myself HTML and CSS in my freshman year of high school, and then I studied a lot of other visual communications like photography, calligraphy, and video and music production.
At Western Washington University I started out in the design major, but wanted to focus more on web, which wasn't really offered back then. So I switched to computer science for my senior year and built my own major focused on front-end development. I also did a philosophy minor, mostly just because I liked the classes.
After working in the tech industry for a few years, I decided to go back to school to study Chinese and Creative Writing, adding a minor in English creative writing to my degree. Unfortunately, I didn't get to finish the Chinese major, but I'm still learning independently and don't plan on stopping anytime soon.", "options" : [ { "text" : "Tell me more about web development.", "dialogId": "21", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "So do you speak Chinese?", "dialogId": "22", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Do you have any hobbies?", "dialogId": "24", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Can you show me your portfolio?", "dialogId": "5", "alternate": "Can you show me your portfolio again?" } ] }, { "id" : 21, "text" : "Well, I started developing websites in probably the 6th grade. No, I'm not kidding. It's fascinating actually how far technology has come just in my lifetime.
I suppose I'm what they call a \"full stack\" developer, in that I can program server-side and client-side, know how to manage hosting and databases, and I'm also highly skilled in display languages like HTML and CSS. I've worked with a lot of different languages and frameworks, but I usually prefer plain vanilla JS, HTML, and CSS, unless there is a valid reason to use something else. I've also used a lot of different CMS platforms, but WordPress has typically dominated the landscape of my career.
Generally, I have a preference for following Occam's Razor, and find that it's best practice in most aspects of life not to unnecessarily complicate things.", "options" : [ { "text" : "What is your editing and publishing experience?", "dialogId": "23", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "What was your education like?", "dialogId": "20", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Do you have any hobbies?", "dialogId": "24", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Can you show me your portfolio?", "dialogId": "5", "alternate": "Can you show me your portfolio again?" } ] }, { "id" : 22, "text" : "可以，但恐怕不算太流利。
I probably only have an HSK 3 or 4 level of proficiency in standard Mandarin (it goes up to 6 to be considered fluent), but I'm still learning. I can understand a lot of common phrases, and can usually get the general idea in conversations, but I'm not very good at speaking off the cuff and lack a lot of specialized vocabulary. And the many diverse accents and dialects make it difficult to understand people who don't speak in the standard dialect teachers use in school.", "options" : [ { "text" : "What is your editing and publishing experience?", "dialogId": "23", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Tell me more about web development.", "dialogId": "21", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Do you have any hobbies?", "dialogId": "24", "alternate": "Tell me about your other hobbies again." }, { "text" : "Can you show me your portfolio?", "dialogId": "5", "alternate": "Can you show me your portfolio again?" } ] }, { "id" : 23, "text" : "I've had scattered editing and publishing experience throughout my career, for example designing covers and formatting print materials and eBooks for publication, but recently I've been focusing more on writing and editing with an aim to move into a more language-based career.
While doing my post-baccalaureate study, I had the opportunity to develop and act as executive editor for the first bilingual magazine at Western Washington University, and I hope in the future to work more in localization editing and translation, as I find it a fascinating field.", "options" : [ { "text" : "Do you have writing samples?", "dialogId": "39", "alternate": "Can I see your writing samples again?" }, { "text" : "Do you have any hobbies?", "dialogId": "24", "alternate": "What are your hobbies again?" }, { "text" : "Can you show me your portfolio?", "dialogId": "5", "alternate": "Can you show me your portfolio again?" } ] }, { "id" : 24, "text" : "Of Course! I have lots of hobbies! I love to read, write, and play the piano. I also love to travel and explore new places. I'm a huge fan of the ocean and the mountains, and I love to go hiking and camping. I also enjoy playing video games with friends, or snuggling with my cats while watching cDramas. ☺️ ", "options" : [ { "text" : "What are your cats' names?", "dialogId": "25", "alternate": "Remind me of your cats' names.." }, { "text" : "Where have you traveled?", "dialogId": "26", "alternate": "Where have you traveled again?" }, { "text" : "We got a little off-topic here.", "dialogId": "13" } ] }, { "id" : 25, "text" : "Azula and Mei! And yes, they are both named after characters from Avatar: The Last Airbender. Azula is a tortie, and Mei is solid black.", "options" : [ { "text" : "Cute!", "dialogId": "10" }, { "text" : "(Your only acceptable response is \"Cute!\")", "dialogId": "10" } ] }, { "id" : 26, "text" : "Quite a few places! I've been to China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and obviously Canada. I've also been to a lot of places in the United States, including Hawaii, San Francisco, New York, the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and I've hiked all over the Olympic Peninsula.", "options" : [ { "text" : "Where was your favorite place?", "dialogId": "27", "alternate": "Remind me of your favorite place you've traveled." }, { "text" : "Why were you in China?", "dialogId": "28", "alternate": "Why were you in China again?" } ] }, { "id" : 27, "text" : "Oh, that's really hard... I've been to Japan a few times, and I really enjoy the smaller towns there. Takayama or Fujiyoshida are both really nice. As an introvert, I'm not a fan of big cities, but I've found that the smaller towns are nice and peaceful. As with many places in East Asia, there is a lot of culture and history, as well as modern conveniences that make it a great place to visit.", "options" : [ { "text" : "...", "dialogId": "13" }, { "text" : "Why were you in China?", "dialogId": "28", "alternate": false } ] }, { "id" : 28, "text" : "I went to Qingdao, Shandong Province, for a \"summer camp\" at Ocean University of China. The program was designed to be a sort of tour to encourage international students to come to China to study. If I wanted to pursue a masters in Chinese literature for example, I would probably want to go to a university over there for it. Qingdao is more known for their ocean sciences though.
It was a program suggested by my professor, and I went with two other students from Western. Since I was an experienced traveler and they were not, we took the opportunity to do a little extra travel, and spent a few days in Taipei before flying to the mainland, and then I took them on a tour of my favorite places in Japan on the way back.", "options" : [ { "text" : "What did you think of China?", "dialogId": "29" }, { "text" : "We got a little off-topic here.", "dialogId": "13" } ] }, { "id" : 29, "text" : "Oh, it was great! In terms of travel logistics, very similar to Japan and Taiwan, for things like the subway and train systems. You have to figure out how to use QR codes to buy things, and that's a little annoying at first, but you get the hang of it. The food is great, and the people are very friendly.
One of the major differences between traveling to China and other countries like South Korea or Japan is that if you are visibly foreign, you will be approached by a lot of people asking to take photos with you, or just exclaiming \"foreigner!\" when they see you and then being shocked you understand Chinese. It's a little awkward, but it's also a great way to practice your Chinese.", "options" : [ { "text" : "...", "dialogId": "13" } ] }, { "id" : 30, "text" : "Good thing it's not your website then! 😄", "options" : [ { "text" : "...", "dialogId": "13" } ] }, { "id" : 31, "text" : "Oh... well, in that case, I hope you're impressed!
I promise I'm a very serious person when it comes to work, but I just couldn't resist the opportunity to make my portfolio a little bit silly. Life's too short to take yourself too seriously, right?",
"options" :
[
{
"text" : "Very true!",
"dialogId": "13"
},
{
"text" : "...",
"dialogId": "32"
}
]
},
{
"id" : 32,
"text" : "Awkward...",
"options" :
[
{
"text" : "Yeah...",
"dialogId": "13"
}
]
},
{
"id" : 33,
"text" : "Oh, very cool! I hope it was fully functional!",
"options" :
[
{
"text" : "It was!",
"dialogId": "13"
},
{
"text" : "It was not...",
"dialogId": "34"
}
]
},
{
"id" : 34,
"text" : "Oh... that's awkward. In that case, you should shoot me an email so I can fix it.",
"options" :
[
{
"text" : "...",
"dialogId": "13"
},
{
"text" : "Can you give me your contact info?",
"dialogId": "4",
"alternate": "Remind me of your contact information."
}
]
},
{
"id" : 35,
"text" : "Wow, it's really hard to pick a favorite over a 10+ year career, but I've always been partial to the projects that end up with a physical product. Something tangible you can touch and keep. Websites are great, but they're not tangible. Yet.",
"bodyClass" : "portfolio-mode",
"options" :
[
{
"text" : "Will they be?",
"dialogId": "36"
},
{
"text" : "I'm done, take me back.",
"dialogId": "9"
}
]
},
{
"id" : 36,
"text" : "Who knows? With VR, AR, and haptic feedback accessories...maybe soon!
But I don't wanna be the one programming tactile data, that's for sure.",
"bodyClass" : "portfolio-mode",
"options" :
[
{
"text" : "...",
"dialogId": "7"
},
{
"text" : "I'm done, take me back.",
"dialogId": "9"
}
]
},
{
"id" : 37,
"text" : "I worked for five years at a company called WompMobile, where we tackled the tricky job of making existing websites mobile-friendly, which was particularly useful for big companies with complex, outdated code. Our solutions saved their dev teams a lot of headaches. Over the years, I got to work with some pretty big names like AT&T, Zales, American Cancer Society, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and Providence Health, to name a few.",
"options" :
[
{
"text" : "What did you do on these projects?",
"dialogId": "38"
},
{
"text" : "What are your thoughts on web development?",
"dialogId": "21",
"alternate": false
},
{
"text" : "What is your editing and publishing experience?",
"dialogId": "23",
"alternate": false
},
{
"text" : "What was your education like?",
"dialogId": "20",
"alternate": false
},
{
"text" : "Do you have any hobbies?",
"dialogId": "24",
"alternate": false
}
]
},
{
"id" : 38,
"text" : "I was a team lead, so for many projects I acted as the project lead and primary point of contact for the client while also serving as the technical lead and primary developer. This usually involved attending lots of meetings with the client, and then translating their requirements into a technical plan that could be implemented by the development team. I also worked closely with junior developers on my team to ensure the projects were implemented correctly and met the client's needs.
Occasionally, being a team lead and one of the most senior developers, I would be asked to go along with our sales team to pitch for new business. This was always an interesting change of pace for me. As the technical representative, it was my job to quickly understand the client's development structure and answer questions about how our products could theoretically integrate with their existing systems, a challenge I found very rewarding.", "options" : [ { "text" : "Can you show me your portfolio?", "dialogId": "5", "alternate" : "Can you show me your portfolio again?" }, { "text" : "What are your thoughts on web development?", "dialogId": "21", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "What is your editing and publishing experience?", "dialogId": "23", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "What was your education like?", "dialogId": "20", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Do you have any hobbies?", "dialogId": "24", "alternate": false } ] }, { "id" : 39, "text" : "I have a few poems as examples in my portfolio, but if you want to see more prose writing, I suppose I could show you a short story or two.", "options" : [ { "text" : "Take me to your portfolio.", "dialogId": "5", "alternate" : "Take me back to your portfolio." }, { "text" : "I'd like to see a short story.", "dialogId": "40", "alternate": "I'd like to see your short stories again." } ] }, { "id" : 40, "text" : "I've got three finished short stories you're welcome to read:
The first is called \"Coming and Going\", and it's a very short flash fiction (only 700 words) about the complicated nature of losing family.
The second is a Sci-Fi short story called \"Margin for Error\". It's about how a small crew on a multi-generational research vessel deals with the unexpected appearance of the worst kind of monster in their midst–man. It's about 4,000 words, and there is a trigger warning for violence and SA.
The third is a story called \"Dreamhunter\", and it's about a writer who suffers from insomnia due to the fact that a literal monster is hunting him in his dreams. But, is it only a dream? It's about 4,500 words, and I actually developed a full movie script based on this story for a film writing class, but I haven't quite finished it yet.", "options" : [ { "text" : "Let me read \"Coming and Going\".", "dialogId": "41", "alternate" : "Let me read \"Coming and Going\" again." }, { "text" : "Let me read \"Margin for Error\".", "dialogId": "42", "alternate": "Let me read \"Margin for Error\" again." }, { "text" : "Let me read \"Dreamhunter\".", "dialogId": "43", "alternate": "Let me read \"Dreamhunter\" again." }, { "text" : "Nevermind, I don't have time.", "dialogId": "44" } ] }, { "id" : 41, "text" : "Okeydokey!", "function" : "showStory('comingAndGoing')" }, { "id" : 42, "text" : "Alright, buckle up!", "function" : "showStory('marginForError')" }, { "id" : 43, "text" : "Sure thing, here you go!", "function" : "showStory('dreamhunter')" }, { "id" : 44, "text" : "Ok, that's no problem. Would you like to talk about something else?", "options" : [ { "text" : "Tell me about yourself.", "dialogId": "2", "alternate": "Tell me about yourself again." }, { "text" : "Tell me about this website.", "dialogId": "11", "alternate": "Tell me about this website again." }, { "text" : "Show me your portfolio.", "dialogId": "5", "alternate": "Take me back to your portfolio." }, { "text" : "Can you give me your contact info?", "dialogId": "4", "alternate": "Remind me of your contact information." }, { "text" : "You must really love talking to yourself.", "dialogId": "14", "alternate": false }, { "text" : "Nope, I'm good for now.", "dialogId": "6" } ] } ] }