A confession.

It’s time I unloaded a secret I’ve been keeping to myself for months.  It’s been tearing at me, knowing the truth about myself but unable to tell anyone.  Little by little, I realized what I was becoming, and slowly, I confessed the truth to select people.  I started with my small group of friends and family, then one by one, I took my coworkers aside and told them.

It wasn’t easy, and I was prepared for some negative reactions, but I never got a single one.  Every one of you that I’ve told so far has been extremely understanding and generous.  My confession is that…

…I am bi-coastal. 

(Sorry if you were hoping that I was gay.  I don’t think the gay community will miss a ponytailed 39 year old technologist with aspirations of being a chef, photographer, and poker player.)

Sarah and I have setup two residences on each coast to appease our joint professional and personal needs.  We’ve got an apartment in Washington DC in Tenleytown and a domicile in San Jose.  I also have an airplane roller bag that I intend to become very chummy with.  Over the next few months we’re going to sell our house in DC and pickup one in San Francisco, which will become our home base.

On a professional level I’m going to be covering Sacramento, San Francisco, and San Jose for Mindshare.  I’m also still going to be just as active in the management of the firm, since thanks to technology, I can berate my staff about their billable percentages from long distances as well as in person.  At the moment I’ve got plans to be in DC one week of every month, so I’m not expecting much to change in that respect.

On a personal level we intend to be closer to our Burning Man friends who mostly live in San Francisco and surrounding areas.  Since I’ll be in DC 25% of the time, I don’t expect to lose touch with anyone.  However I think the ones who will lose out will be Sarah’s friends in DC who won’t get to see her much.

All our e-mail addresses will continue to work, and I’ll be updating my phone numbers in my "How To Contact Shabbir" page with a DC and a SF local phone number.  Both forward to my cellphone, so finding me should continue to be trivial.

Professionally, Sarah’s got a lot of exciting stuff happening in her life, but I’ll let her tell you about that.

See you soon…somewhere…perhaps in seat 12B on the Nerd Bird.