WELCOME
Greetings people. Sit back and relax and listen to me talk all about myself.
I hail from the South Side of Chicago (Hyde Park) where I grew up with my parents and an older sister and deep dish pizza. After attending the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools and graduating in 1989 (now you can figure out how old I am), I attended Beloit College in Beloit, Wisconsin where I graduated with a bachelor's degree in mathematics in 1993. Beloit is famous for their anthropology department, looking gorgeous in the fall, and of course the cheese breeze of the Cheetos factory nearby, especially on a rainy day. Afterwards I attended the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana where I got my Masters in Business Administration. While pursuing my business degree, I became infatuated with college sports, especially football and basketball. Today not a day goes by that I do not watch ESPN for at least a half hour a day to get the scoop on all sports so I can beat my husband in the weekly College Pick 'Em and the basketball brackets. In addition to getting hooked on college sports and the like, I also met the love of my life, Jason Sagan, there and we have a five year old son named Jared.
During my time at Illinois and after a lot of Fighting Illini football, basketball, volleyball etc, I began to realize that my true strength lay in teaching. I took a year after my 1995 graduation to teach in a small private school on the East Coast to see if that was where my strengths really existed. During this time my husband - to- be accepted a job outside of Athens, Georgia at an automotive plant as a quality engineer. After the school year ended, I applied and was accepted to the University of Georgia Masters in Mathematics Education. Which is how I ended up in Georgia for eight years prior to moving to Fort Wayne. Eight years of living in a town whose most famous citizens include Kim Basinger and Michael Stipe of the group REM and proclaimed grits as the official food of Georgia.
After getting my education degree, I taught for the next six years at two different high schools, teaching everything from pre-algebra up to trigonometry (I taught calculus during my time on the East Coast). After our son was born, we realized we wanted to move closer to where our families lived (still in Chicago) so that they could see their grandchild more often. Hence my husband accepted an engineering position just outside of Fort Wayne, Indiana, and not long after that we all moved to Fort Wayne in June of 2004.
During my spare time, my greatest passion is running. I have been a long distance runner since I was 17. I run anything from one mile all the way up to 26.2 miles, which I did twice when I ran the 2000 and 2005 Chicago Marathons. Now I either run by myself or I run with a jogging stroller so I can take my son along for the ride. It must have rubbed off because since then my husband has completed several marathons himself and our son has run a few 100 meter dashes! Besides running and all things college sports, I also read, do paint by numbers puzzles (these are horribly addictive), and try to beat my husband in Jeopardy and College Football Pick 'Ems and March Madness Basketball Brackets.
My favorite authors include Erich Segal, James Patterson, Nicholas Sparks, and Anne Brashares, who wrote the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series. I listen to all sorts of music except for heavy metal and most things country, although I don't mind Shania Twain or George Strait. Right now my musical preferences seem to cover everything from classical music to Animaniacs songs to anything on any Top 40 radio station. And I am proud to say that I did have one brush with celebrity fame, when I met Ethan Zohn, the winner of "Survivor: Africa, Season 3." I am also almost-proud to say that I did have an opportunity to audition for Jeopardy a couple of times but sadly it was just not meant to be.