Hi, I'm Greg!

I’m a software and mechanical engineer, whitewater kayaker, climber, skier, and general outdoor enthusiast. This is my (curated) life. I hope you find the ideas stimulating, the photos beautiful, and the rescue stories not too harrowing. Let me know if you have any feedback, positive or negative, and definitely let me know if you spot any bugs!

Education and Work

I studied mechanical engineering with a focus in Mechatronics at Stanford University for undergrad and grad school. I worked in med devices for awhile, doing all the mechanical, electrical, and software design for a number of new device prototypes. Some of my devices were used in pig studies and first in man, and I also am the co-author on a number of patents. Many of those prototypes became companies that are still in development today.

But med devices are sloooow, and I wanted something faster paced. So, I switched to software. I started by building apps for both iOS and Android. I’ve since done a bit of everything, including API design, ETL pipeline work, database queries, and more. Recently, I’ve been doing research into machine learning, with the goal of finding a better algorithm to combine the logic of traditional compute with the flexibility of neural networks. I’m a firm believer that there’s a game changing software solution for AI that will run on a current laptop.

I like modular, precise, low maintenance code. I tend to trend towards the functional side, but I appreciate a good object oriented solution. I love the moment that I find a tool or API that perfectly and simply describes a problem space. For me, Vim is one of those tools. Vim provides a simple, expressive language to master editing text. I also use Emacs Org Mode, although Emacs sort of violates my low maintenance prescription. I’m comfortable coding in Python, Julia, Javascript, Java, Objective-C, and Swift, and I’ve dabbled in Clojure and Lisp. I also have experience programming microcontrollers in C and Assembly, although it's been awhile. I always enjoy learning new languages, and I think either Rust or Go will be the next up!

This blog

This blog represents my first real foray into web frontend. I must say, it feels like there is a lot of room for improvement. Html is not a good intermediary between what we want to see on screen, and how we would want to describe those views. That said, it seems that deployment and responsive design are much easier than they used to be, so that’s great. This blog is based loosely on the Tailwind NextJS Starter Blog, and is built on React, Tailwind, NextJs, and deployed on Vercel. I ended up changing the design quite a bit and rebuilding a lot of the site, but it was great to have a starting point.

The Great Outdoors

I spend a lot of my time outside. I don’t come from an outdoorsy family, so I found backpacking and climbing in college. From there, I never looked back. Specifically, my experiences with SPOT (Stanford Pre-Orientation Trips) and the Stanford Kayak Club shaped who I am today. Thank you to all the people who showed me the ropes all those years ago, you literally changed my life!

Whitewater kayaking has been my primary focus for the last ten years or so. I’ve paddled many of the classic rivers across North America and the world. I’ve done a first descent, on the Bowser river in BC. I’ve helped rescue someone with a broken neck in NY, survived falling iguanas in Belize, been eaten alive by mosquitos in Quebec, and dodged icebergs on the Alsek in Alaska/BC. I’ve paddled in 115 degree heat on the Grand Canyon, and on a frigid New Year’s Day in New England, where the air was 0 degrees and the water was 21 degrees (super-cooled). There are so many amazing rivers out there, and some of my favorites are Cherry Creek in CA, the Stikine in BC, and the Alseseca in Mexico.

I also have the privilege of serving on the board of American Whitewater, the premier non-profit for boaters and upper watershed conservation. AW is one of the best organizations I’ve ever been a part of, and we are so lucky as kayakers to have such a strong group of people advocating for us. With a small but national staff, they take on power companies for dam releases, water rights issues in CO, Wild and Scenic river designations, National Forest planning, and much more. Even if you're not a boater, if you are interested in public lands access and conservation, consider donating!

I’m an avid rock climber. I started off as a boulderer, and I mostly climb sport these days. I’m a bit of a completionist: I just completed a personal goal of doing all the first pitch sport routes at the local crag, Broughton Bluff. There are around 90 routes from 5.9-5.13d, some of which hadn’t been climbed in 20 years. I’ve climbed up to V10, 5.13d, and I’m hoping to send my first 5.14 soon!

I’ve been skiing my whole life (and I raced a bit in college), but that’s more of a social thing for me these days. I do a lot of telemarking now. Free the heel, free the mind. You’ll also see some winter photos from my occasional forays into the backcountry.

One last note: I built this blog in November 2022. The posts are all backdated to when they happened, not when they were posted. Also, I had two previous attempts at a blog, on Github Pages at gregliest.github.io from 2014-2015, and on Medium around 2017-2018. I’ve included those posts for historical purposes.

Enjoy!

Gregory Lee, November 2022.