5 March

So it’s been a long time since I have written. A lot has happened and we have been very blessed. I’ll try to high light the things that have happened and then go back in and fill in the spaces with more details.

As I have written I was laid off from Intel last year. I found out about it around March, worked until May, had June, July and most of August off and finally ended my career at Intel at the end of September. During that time I worked to build up a company with Kelli's dad, Jim to serve primarily Intel as their PCB design company. In October, Intel came back to us and said that the project they were ramping and wanted us to work on had been canceled corporate wide. Our prospect to have plenty of work diminished to nothing. At that pint I was running out of money and needed to do something. I started looking for jobs, sending out resumes etc. In the middle of October, I was in negotiations with a company back east when I received a call on Monday the 22, from a guy in Florida asking me if I know enough of Cadence (a PB design tool) to come to Florida and by the way could I be there in 2 days. It sounded like something I could do. I told him yes and on Wednesday I flew out to Florida for a job that was supposed to last 4-6 weeks. While in Florida I worked 60 hours a week 14-16 hours a day. It was very interesting work and I enjoyed the work a lot. Because of the schedule, I did not get out much. I did however take the time to go to the temple twice (the first time I drove in, I could not find the temple). I attended church meetings in the local chapel which was nice and I was able to drive out to the coast to the Kennedy Space Center (which was truly the best part of my time in Florida and a fantastic experience). I was also able to see the launch of a rocket (which was really cool). I really wanted to see the space shuttle take off but I missed it by 2 days. I was there when it landed but that was not a bid deal. I heard the sonic booms a longs ways off. We could not see the shuttle as it came in. After almost 5 weeks in Florida, I came home for Thanksgiving. Towards the end of my time in Florida, I got a call from my old work associates at L3 Communications in SLC. They wanted me to start a contract with them for a few weeks ASAP. I told them I was in Florida and would be coming home after Thanksgiving. They were disappointed but they wanted me as soon as I could get there. So I made arrangements to start working with L3 as soon as I got back into Utah. In the mean time things were wrapping up with Florida and then suddenly there was a huge problem. The customer did not provide the specifications that were required to get the boards done right and the boards were bad. I needed to fix them but was leaving for Utah. We agreed that I would continue to work for Florida from home in Utah while I was working for L3. Thus, all of December was a huge whirlwind. Working 30 to 40 hours a week for L3 and another 30-40 hours with Florida, I was exhausted. I was able to survive – regularly working until 10:00 pm and getting up at 2 or 3 in the morning and continuing work for Florida. I didn’t see much of my family at all in December and took one day off on Christmas and another 2 days off for the New Year. Other than that I worked. This schedule continued all thought January and started to ease off a bit in February. Kelli and the kids were great – and Kelli totally made this possible by running everything else in our household while I was working. Toward the middle of January, L3 came to me and said that they wanted to make an offer for me to work permanently. I had also still been looking for another direct job in other places and had talked to the Mentor Graphics Corporation in California and NVIDEA Corporation in Santa Clara California. In January, NVIDEA asked me to come down to CA for an onsite interview. I agreed and in the middle of January, I went down to Santa Clara for an interview. I arrived Thursday evening late, got up at 3:00am and did some work on a board from Florida and went to my interview at 10:00. The interview went great. It was the best interview I’ve done. I was calm and was able to answer all the questions quite well (I thought). I think that being busy right up to the time before the interview helped. I did not have time to stress over it. NVIDEA said that they would get back to me in a week. I finally heard from them 4 weeks later and they had decided not to hire anyone at that time. In the meantime, L3 continued talking about an offer. The first week of February, L3 came back with an offer. I was blown away. They offered me the same rate, I was making with Intel which was totally unexpected. I was so grateful and humbled. We accepted right away and my first official start date was February 11. I am 100% certain that the Lord made all of this happen. This was his plan and I know that we have been very blessed.