How’s it going?
Well that’s a fraught question to ask a small business owner in May of 2025.
What’s changed since you wrote your intro post?
Everything and nothing!
Long-time readers know a lot has changed but I’m healthy and back to whatever you’d call normal for me. Work-wise, I still do hardware dev (schematic capture, PCB routing). I swapped the program we use for doing this, so evaluating and learning a new program has been a process.
Where do you find new music/art?
Lots of places, but so much of what I listen to comes from friends and customers who I have met through Noise Engineering. In addition, one of my favorite things to do is a song trade with a new acquaintance: we just send each other something cool to listen to.
Where have you been finding inspiration?
Always from the artists we work with. When I’m tired or frustrated or whatever, I look at something an artist is doing with our products and I’m reinvigorated. Knowing that we help people create the things they do is incredibly motivating and inspiring. I love to talk to them about their pain points in creating music, and also think about what sort of products we could create that would suit genres and specific artists.
What’s your favorite non-work activity of late?
Still aerial. Silks remain my favorite home apparatus, but I’m working on a piece on aerial chains I’ll perform with a friend in June. I’m particularly excited about this performance because it’s to a Snakes of Russia song, …And Raise Your Hands to the Sky. I first heard this song years ago when he released this album and thought, “I want to do a chains performance to this song.” At that point, I had never been on chains! Years later, it’s finally happening…and even better, the song uses some of our products!
Also, hanging out with our goofball dogs, Alice and Eddy, never gets old.
What are you reading these days?
I have been reading the Nightmare, Arizona series by Beth Dolgner. She was a recommendation from an NE customer and the series is just super fun and light. Imagine a haunted house where all the monsters are really what they seem, not costumes.
What’s something you’re proud of?
I am extremely proud of our environmental accomplishments and commitment. There’s always more to do, but I love that the whole team is fully behind doing the work.
What’s something new you’ve tried this year?
This year I got a soldering table. We have been trying to reduce costs and prototyping remains a really expensive thing, so we invested in trying to do more hand builds to start. There was a little trial and error in the beginning (in which the house may or may not have smelled like burned PCB for a week), but I think I have a handle on it now. I have a new-found love of solder paste!
What are you working on that you’re excited about?
Stephen writes all the code for our products, but he’s been slowly setting it up so there is a bit of an entry for me. I do the schematics and PCBs, and Stephen has set up a process where I can start what we call the spudding code. I do this prior to ordering the prototype and the system is set up to do a number of checks for things that are easy to mess up, like using a non-ADC pin for an ADC. C++ is (to me) complicated, but I am slowly getting the hang of the basics and this is fun. Plus, once I really have this sorted, writing this code saves Stephen a ton of time when we get the prototype in hand.
What are you hoping to work on in the future?
More C++, more prototypes. Also, more education and outreach.
What’s your favorite travel destination?
Before Noise Engineering, I was a biologist working on tropical ecosystems (among other things). I spent a lot of time in Central and South America, and that still feels like home.
If you had to move somewhere different, where would you want to go?
I have asked Stephen a million times to never make me leave California. But Portugal is really calling to me.
If someone had never been to your city, where would you want to take them?
Angeles National Forest. It is stunningly beautiful and I am awed every time I go.
