About
Hi, I’m Todd Webb. I write a blog, infrequently twitter, take pictures, and raise two boys with my wife Julie. I keep up with friends on Facebook and I maintain a professional network on LinkedIn.
Professional
I am a professional software development manager. I began my career in quality engineering with Harada, a family owned automotive supplier based in Japan. I also worked for Jostens within the printing division and for DaimlerChrysler for nearly 6 years. Most recently I was hired as a project manager and ultimately Director of Development for a small company called Subimo. Subimo was acquired at the end of 2006 by WebMD and I worked there through March of 2008. I am currently looking for a new gig.
General Interests
I am a technologist. I was a kid right at the beginning of the home computer boom. As a result, I dabbled with many different development languages and computers. I believe the first program I ever wrote was in Basic on a Commodore 64 or TI in the mid 80s. In high school I learned Pascal and wrote some programs on Apple computers. I even took a high school computer programming class in 1986 or 1987 during which I basically sat in the computer lab and wrote a grade card entry, storage, and printing system while the rest of the class was sitting on the other side of a big glass window being lectured on basic programming by the teacher. I remember asking my teacher once how to store data on a floppy disk, his response, “I don’t know, but would you share it with me when you figure it out?” Funny that I didn’t select computer science as my major in college (picked Industrial & Operations Engineering instead).
I am a foodie. My most memorable dining experiences included Avenues at the Peninsula in Chicago and the chef’s table at Tribute in Detroit (when Takashi was still chef). I’ve watched way to much Food TV and I actually own a copy of the Professional Chef. I don’t ever want to *be* a professional chef, but my dream, by the time I retire, is to be able to grab a few quality ingredients from the garden/market and turn them into a fantastic restaurant quality meal off the top of my head.
I am a modern architecture enthusiast. I like to dream about retiring in a small modernist place on a beautiful plot of land with a view of mountains, water, or both. Lately I’ve been following developments in prefab modernist homes and green building techniques.
Many People Don’t Know…
I taught myself how to juggle when I was in elementary school. I was inspired by a television program showing jugglers and thought, “I could do that.” I started with three of those big green tree nuts that used to fall on the ground around my house in Ohio (they look like little tennis balls). I think I threw them about 15 feet in the air each time. Eventually I was not too bad at it. In high school I started going to a local juggling club and learned from a guy named Paul Kyprie also known as Zeemo, among others. I rarely get out the equipment anymore except to amuse my two boys once in a while, but I can still juggle clubs, keep 5 balls in the air for a little bit, balance big and little things on my head/nose/foot/hand, and ride a unicycle. Now you’re in the know.
Odd Coincidence
Do you know the Todd Webb who was a famous photographer? To the best of my knowledge I’m not related; however, like him I worked for Chrysler (DaimlerChrysler) near Detroit and I joined the photography club there for a while. He went on to pursue his passion for photography. Me, not so much. I stopped participating in the club when my family started growing and never really considered that I would ever have a career in photography. I do love his work though and urge you to check it out sometime.
