VanWong's
Brian went to Michigan State located a few hours from where he was born & raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I also didn't stray far from my hometown of Fresno, California for college. I ended up attending UC Davis which is about 3 hours away.
Both of us ended up with a Computer Engineering degree. Brian used his at Intel, Truevision, and Pinnacle. At all 3 locations, he actively interacted with OEM customers and with engineers. As always, making long time friends along the way. I almost completed a degree in Biology but the call of work was too loud. Luckily, I was able to apply some of my biology education to my first few jobs working in the Genetics field and 3D-MRI scans.
Between the two of us, we create quite a melting pot. Blue-eyed, tall and lanky, with light brown hair, Brian's a complete contrast to my dark-brown eyed, short stature, and dark brown hair. Luckily, we end up balancing each other out not only with physical features but personality traits too. As many would say, "we complete each other". ...go ahead say it..."awwwww".
Work and Contact Information
Both of us have been working for Pinnacle Systems, Inc. for a number of years. For Brian, it's been since 1995 and myself 1993. Pinnacle has been know to make video equipment used in the Broadcast arena but we have been branching out into the Consumer and Prosumer markets as well. Our hardware/software is used at many affiliated networks such as ABC, NBC, and ESPN.
In 1997, Brian & I were fortunate to attend the Technical Emmys in New York. Together with one of Brian's OEM customers, AVID Technology, Pinnacle received one of it's Emmys for "3D manipulation in Non-Linear editing".
To get more information about Pinnacle, visit the web site.
Like so many couples in the Silicon Valley, we met via work. We started off as co-workers, became friends, and a romance developed. The fun was keeping the romance quiet while we worked together. Most people didn't even know we were dating until we told them we were engaged. Amazingly enough, we survived working together and now we are known as the VanWongs.
The wedding was May of 1999 in Santa Clara, California. Our song is "True Companion" by Marc Cohn. We were fortunate enough to have some many friends and family come from all over to attend. They made a long weekend out of it and did all the California things: mountain biked, got massages, played golf, and a trip to Napa wine valley.
We both love to travel and visit friends. With every location we go, we try to interact with the locals and see the sites. The Hawaiians even thought I was a "local" ... once I got a tan.
We both read quite a bit but Brian wins on the amount and the quality of reading. We both highly recommend The Color of Water. It's a lovely tribute by James McBride to his mother. We laughed, I cried, we did it all. A definite must read.
