About

Here are 10 things about me (updated on Jan. 1, 2018). For details about this site, check out the colophon.

  1. Deeply thankful for my wonderful wife of five years, Joan and our sons, Michael and William.
  2. Competed in the 1988 National Spelling Bee in eighth grade, finishing a respectable 59th out of 200 finalists. My elimination word: patronymic.
  3. Worked as a Walt Disney World College Program “cast member” in 1995. The nickname from my job as a monorail driver inspired the name of this site.
  4. Graduated with honors from Penn State University in 1996, and an avid Nittany Lions fan to this day.
  5. Moved three times in the first 13 months after college; resided in Schenectady, N.Y., and Fort Myers, Fla., for roughly six months each.
  6. Lived in scenic Chesterbrook, Pa., for 11 years before moving to a new house in Newtown Square, Pa., in August 2015.
  7. Inspired by a wide range of music, including the catchy power pop of Fountains of Wayne, the melodic post-punk of Bob Mould, and the timeless cool jazz of Miles Davis.
  8. Fascinated by clocks since I was a kid; my modest collection includes a musical cuckoo clock from West Germany (a childhood gift from my great-uncle Charlie) and a few vintage Simplex electric wall clocks.
  9. Deeply interested in the field of typography; able to identify most typefaces by sight, and not exactly sure how that skill came to be.
  10. Employed in IT at Comcast in Philadelphia for seven years. Details about my professional work are available on a separate site, mikedevine.com.