Job change brings Jamie and Christine to Las Vegas

Jamie and Christine have relocated to Las Vegas, where Jamie started a new job this week as a software engineer with video game company Konami. The couple and their cats moved into a rented, furnished condo in a modern complex about 8 miles south of the Vegas Strip.

The cats making themselves at home

The view from the apartment balcony

The latest change comes just 15 months after C&J moved from Los Angeles to a house they bought in Schenectady, N.Y. Jamie was then working remotely for LA-based Skybound Entertainment. Unfortunately, after Skybound released its premiere video game, the company laid off Jamie and numerous others who had worked to create it.

With employment currently tight in the video game industry, Jamie was unable to line up another remote-work position, but accepted a strong offer from Konami. The company's current focus is largely on video gaming machines for casinos - hence the Las Vegas location for its U.S. headquarters.

Jamie and Christine view the latest move as a new adventure. While neither is a fan of gambling, they're looking forward to exploring the dining and entertainment of Vegas - and the natural wonders of the many parks in and near Nevada.

Catching up with Mary and her family

Editor's note: At Brien's St. Patrick's Day Parade party last month, Mary shared several pieces of news - and agreed to write them up for The Birch Street Web. Here is her account.

So much has changed, so I’ll just dive right in and start with myself. I decided to sell the townhouse I was living in, that I inherited from my mother, and I bought a house on Sacandaga Lake - 15 minutes from my son’s house, so, closer to the grandkids. I’m directly across the street from the lake and have lakefront rights.

I moved in last spring (2022) and spent a lot of time kayaking and then snowshoeing this past winter. It’s a cozy 3-bedroom, 1½ bath ranch with den and full basement on half an acre, perfect for me and my dog, Luna.

I rescued this little hound last March and she has been amazing so far - loves kayaking and going snowshoeing with me. (I had to put the Big Guy / the great dane down.) Roger and I have parted ways so it was perfect timing buying the house. I have incredible neighbors and the Sacandaga Brewery is less than 3 miles away (nice bike ride LOL).

I am switching positions at my job within my organization, the Boys and Girls Club of the Capital Area, which operates Universal Pre-Kindergarten programs at public schools in the area. I am currently the UPK Director for the Cohoes City School District. I oversee 8 classrooms and have 21 employees. But I will be transitioning to the role of Director of Operations and will be overseeing all 24 of our UPK classrooms in 3 different school districts (Albany, Watervliet, and Cohoes), with a staff of 56. I also will be overseeing the directors that run after-school programming and aquatics -- so, exciting times, venturing a bit outside of the Early Childhood world.

I am also starting a consulting company: WOO Consulting (Wise Old Owl), offering life coaching, spiritual life coaching and holistic healing. During the pandemic I became certified in all three areas. I have been running a free 6-week pilot program with 6 clients to get feedback on their experiences and overall impression of the coaching and goal-setting. So far, the follow up conversations have been incredible and so helpful. I am meeting with a business consultant to file a DBA and set up web-site and social-media platforms -- so more to come on that once I am up and officially running.

Now, updates on my children:

Brienna is still living in Saratoga with her boyfriend, Tommy, and is currently attending art school. She is concentrating on graphic design and seems to be loving it. (Photo: Brienna and Tommy with Barkley, a Christmas gift from Mary.)

Brienna's son, Cash, is turning 12 in August and is in middle school -- crazy how time goes by. He lives in Lexington, Ky., with his dad and stepmother, and has a baby brother who is now 6 months old. Brienna still sees Cash often throughout the year and every day on FaceTime -- thank goodness for social media.

Brennan and Shauna Rae and their kiddos, Brooklyn (11) and Brennan (8), are doing amazing. My son and his wife have both completed their Masters degrees. Brennan is currently a physical education teacher for Fulton/Montgomery Elementary School and Shauna-Rae is teaching special-education high school math in Broadalbin, as well as pursuing her administration degree. The kids are busy playing basketball, soccer, baseball and softball.

The family is thinking about relocating to Tampa, Fla., after the school year ends; their house just went on the market to see if this might be feasible. They might not be 15 minutes around the corner from me for long! But I reassured them that I will just book more frequent-flyer miles -- and the kiddos can still enjoy snow on their winter break, as they can spend it with me in NY!

Shannon and Mary

Shannon is a staff sergeant in the U.S. Air Force. She has been married for 3 years -- and she and her husband, Frederick, are expecting their first baby, a girl, in mid-July. 

The couple met when both were stationed at Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio. (Their wedding was simple, with no reception; a friend of theirs married them. Young military, haha!) They later transferred to Eglin AFB in the Florida Panhandle, and bought a house in Crestwood, Fla. Frederick, who was a staff sergeant and medic in the Air Force, just separated from the service and is pursuing his degree in medicine through the GI Bill. Shannon works as a pharmaceutical technician at Eglin.

Shannon and Frederick

Brienna and Mary at the Terrapin Brewery in Athens Georgia - a pit stop on the way to see Shannon in Florida 

Rebecca to curl at world tournament in Scotland

Rebecca and her teammates from the Rochester Curling Club will compete against teams from around the globe in the World Mixed Curling Championship tournament this October in Aberdeen, Scotland.

Rebecca's parents, Doug and Lisa; her Aunt Julie and Uncle Dan; her Aunt Cathy and cousins Christopher and Stephanie all are planning trips to Scotland to cheer her on and do some sightseeing on the side.

As previously reported here, the team won USA Curling's 2022 U.S. Mixed National Championship, held on the Rochester club's ice in April. The team has launched a GoFundMe campaign, "asking friends, family, and curling enthusiasts for a small donation" to help defray travel expenses. Anyone interested can donate here.

Meanwhile, Rebecca earlier this year started a new job in a new field, literally: a flower farm. She is now part of the small crew growing and harvesting blooms at Trademarks Flower Farm in Clifton Springs, N.Y. 

Rebecca says she's happy to have made the switch from an office/lab job to working outdoors in nature. When not on the job, she can be found tending her own home garden, leading hiking trips for RIT students as an adjunct instructor - and, of course, curling.

CJ, Vivien, Charlie and Austin moving to London

Vivien, CJ and their two sons are setting off this week for London, where they expect to spend the next two years. CJ, a senior vice president at Brookfield Asset Management, is taking on a new assignment helping to expand the company's multi-family housing business in Europe.

Kensington Palace

The family will be settling into a flat in London's Kensington neighborhood (less than a mile from the palace shown here). Charlie, now 3 1/2, will soon start pre-school at a Montessori academy a short walk from home. He will turn 4 in September, and Austin will have his second birthday the same month.

CJ, who has been with Brookfield in New York for over four years, will be based in London but will also be traveling around the European Union. The company has been ramping up its investments in European apartment properties, largely by buying existing firms. He has already visited Brookfield's operations in several cities as he prepared for the new job.

Jamie lands 'dream job' - She and Christine will move to California later this year

Christine and Jamie at a park near their NJ home

Jamie is about to begin a new job as a game designer with Riot Games, the developer and publisher of the very popular League of Legends multi-player online video game.

Starting Sept. 27, Jamie will be part of a team that designs “skins,” which customize the appearance of characters in the game, and develops in-game and in-person events.

“This is a dream job for me,” said Jamie, who received the employment offer from Riot while recovering from surgery last month. She is recuperating nicely at home in Hamilton, N.J., where she and Christine moved this summer to be close to the surgical specialist.

Jamie will work remotely for the first few months. Then, the couple will move to Southern California, and Jamie will join her team at Riot’s headquarters in Santa Monica. The company will provide relocation assistance, and Jamie and Christine are now researching neighborhoods in Greater Los Angeles.

For the past two and a half years, Jamie worked as a software developer at Visible Body, which develops apps for medical professionals. Her office was in Newton Upper Falls, Mass., although the company switched to remote working in Spring 2020 due to the pandemic. Jamie previously worked at Boston Productions, a developer of interactive exhibits for museums.

The move to Southern California will be a new adventure for Jamie, who grew up in New Hampshire, and Christine, a New Jersey native.

Birch Street Web editor retires from 'day job'

Dan pays last visit to Hoboken office, June 29, 2021

After more than 45 years as a working journalist, Dan retired June 30 from his most recent employer, Green Street News.

His career began in local radio news at WSTC-Stamford and WOBM-Toms River. That was followed by 21 years at The Associated Press in New York, Washington and New Jersey, 12 years at The Star-Ledger newspaper in New Jersey, and nearly 11 years at the business-newsletter company known as Harrison Scott Publications until its 2020 acquisition by Green Street Advisors.

The past year and a half was quite eventful. Dan was promoted in January 2020 to lead editor for two of the company's four publications (Real Estate Alert and Commercial Mortgage Alert). The next month, the company was sold. The month after that, its office in Hoboken was closed due to the pandemic. From March 13, 2020 onward, Dan worked from a home office he set up in daughter Christine's former bedroom. From there he was able to manage the two newsletters' reporting teams, edit articles and train new editors.

The months of working from home allowed Dan to avoid long daily commutes, take daily walks with Julie - and, obviously, let his hair grow. It made the transition to retirement seem less jarring, with no change in his everyday surroundings. "And it seems that Julie can stand having me around the house all day - good practice for being together in retirement."

Among Dan's plans for his new-found free time is reviving The Birch Street Web, which has fallen behind in chronicling the doings of our extended family. He asks your help in filling in the blanks of the past year or so. Please submit your photos and tidbits of news to birchstreetradio@gmail.com

Back on East Coast, Cathy has new job

After a little over a decade in Ohio, Cathy has moved back east and is now living and working in the Philadelphia area.

With daughter Stephanie attending Towson University, and son Christopher in Delaware, Cathy began planning to relocate closer to them and to her parents and siblings. She sold her house in Hilliard, Ohio, in the spring and moved temporarily to Riderwood, Md.

In July, Cathy accepted a position as a Compliance Specialist at Lincoln Financial Group in downtown Philadelphia, and moved to suburban Prospect Park, Pa. The job is similar to the work she had been doing at Nationwide Insurance in Columbus, Ohio - making sure the policies and products sold by the company's agents are suitable for the individual customers.

Cathy is now living in Prospect Park, Pa., within an hour-and-a-half's drive of Stephanie at Towson and even closer to Christopher in Newark, Del. She's already started doing some volunteer work in the community - and, of course, attending Towson University Marching Band performances whenever she can.

Marie takes on bigger role at CodePen

Marie has been promoted to Product Manager at CodePen, where she has worked since becoming the start-up's first employee four years ago.

The company provides a platform for web designers and developers to experiment, test and debug their code, and to share ideas and critiques with one another.

CodePen's three founders hired Marie in September 2015 to handle support, community-outreach and social-media duties. She has written documentation and blog posts, produced podcasts and handled all manner of support issues, all from her home office, as well as representing CodePen at conferences around the country.

Her new job puts her in charge of the growing company's various products and projects.

Family, friends celebrate Liz's master's degree

Liz celebrated her completion of graduate school with a party at a craft brewery in Brooklyn, Circa Brewing. She was joined by a crowd of friends, and by family members including her parents, Doug and Lisa; grandparents Hugh and Dolores; aunts Julie and Cathy; and cousins Christopher and Stephanie.

With her master's degree in transportation engineering and planning from New York University, Liz plans to return to Baltimore. She continues to work for WSP | Parsons Brinckerhof and will transfer back from its New York to its Baltimore office.

Andy moving to Albany with new job

Andy will soon be starting a new job in Albany, N.Y.

After completing a "coding bootcamp" at Rutgers University and then serving as a teaching assistant for the program, Andy has been hired as a junior software engineer at Conduent.

The company, which spun off from Xerox in 2017, provides various services to business and government clients. Based in New Jersey, it has offices around the country, and Andy's job is at its downtown Albany location. He starts March 4.

This past weekend, Andy and Shannon picked out an apartment in Guilderland, just outside Albany, and will be moving there over the next two weeks. Shannon will continue with her online studies in web coding and design.

Andy sharing his web-coding knowledge

After completing a web-coding "bootcamp" through Rutgers University, Andy has now returned to the program - this time as a teaching assistant.

The six-month program trained Andy in "full stack" web development, encompassing a wide range of programming languages and tools. In addition to mastering the course materials, achieving a final grade of A+, he impressed his instructors with his ability to assist fellow students. Upon completing the course in October, he was offered a teaching-assistant job. He started in his new role in mid-January.

In between class sessions, Andy is interviewing for web-developer positions and working on independent projects to further build his portfolio (viewable here).

Dolores and Hugh in article on not-really-retirement

Dolores and Hugh were featured in an article in the June edition of a newspaper that's distributed in all Erickson Living communities. The story, on the topic of keeping busy with work during retirement, included quotes from Dolores, along with this very nice photo of the couple on the balcony of their apartment.

Here's an excerpt:

A benefit that can’t be easily measured is the sense of purpose often found in work. Dolores Andrew is a self-employed artist, instructor, lecturer, and jurist at art shows across the mid-Atlantic. “Art has been my life’s passion,” says the resident of Oak Crest retirement community in Parkville, MD.

Read the article online
See how it appeared in printed form

New adventures for James & Christine

Christine and James are settling into new digs as James prepares to start a new job in the new year.

Having completed work on a bachelors degree in video game design at Rochester Institute of Technology in December, James starts Jan. 2 as a developer at Boston Productions in Norwood, Mass.

C & J were able to find an apartment just a few miles from the company's headquarters, and have spent the past week moving and starting to settle in. Their new home has a spacious two-level layout in a garden-style complex surrounded by a nice residential neighborhood, about a mile from the shops and restaurants in Norwood's village-like downtown.

Norwood Center

James is very much looking forward to working at Boston Productions (BPI), which combines game design and software development with audio-visual production to create interactive displays and "visitor experiences" for museums and other public facilities. Here are just a couple of examples of the company's installations.

At the Smithsonian Institution Castle in Washington, BPI created an interactive map for visitors navigating through the National Mall.

At the Georgia Aquarium, BPI created multiple game-like interactive educational displays.

Genevieve enters the theater world

Genevieve has made another career move. She started this past week as Director of Foundation Relations at Roundabout Theater Company in New York. She'll head the theater operator's efforts to obtain grants from charitable foundations that support the arts.

Genevieve most recently was manager of foundation relations at the Museum of Modern Art, and before that, worked on foundation and government grants at the New York Public Library for about four years.

Roundabout, a nonprofit company founded in 1965, now operates several Broadway and off-Broadway theaters - the American Airlines Theatre, the Stephen Sondheim Theatre, Studio 54, the Laura Pels Theatre and the Roundabout Underground Black Box Theatre.

Liz receives Professional Engineer license

Liz has achieved an important credential in her field: She recently passed the Maryland licensing exam and is now officially a Professional Engineer.

According to the National Society of Professional Engineers, "To become licensed, engineers must complete a four-year college degree, work under a Professional Engineer for at least four years, pass two intensive competency exams and earn a license from their state's licensure board. Then, to retain their licenses, PEs must continually maintain and improve their skills throughout their careers."

A graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Liz has worked since 2012 for WSP|Parsons Brinckerhoff, first in Maryland and currently in New York. She is studying part-time at New York University toward a Masters degree in transportation engineering and planning.

Shannon graduates from USAF tech school

Shannon, who entered the U.S. Air Force just after Christmas, this week completed training as a pharmaceutical technician at the Medical Education and Training campus in San Antonio, Texas.

"Congratulations to my amazingly resilient daughter who is officially graduating from Tech School today at the top of her class," proud mom Mary wrote on Facebook.

"Keesler AFB Biloxi Mississippi in two days," Mary added, so we're guessing that's the next posting for Shannon, now with the rank of Airman.