Hello World

I have been on the internet since the mid 90's when the family had a Packard Bell 486sx, pictured here on the right along with a very teenage me. This was back around the time 14.4 kbps was standard. 33.6 and 56k were around but more expensive. At the time this picture was taken I was obsessed with Rescue Rangers and was heavily active in that early fan community online.

I was a huge nerd then. I even went by the alias of "The RoboNerd" or "The Robo|\|erd" because pipes and slashes were cool keyboard keys. The button on my shirt is totally washed out in this picture but it was a homemade button with the Rescue Rangers logo on it. Yes that was a Mac behind me, specifically a Mac 512k version with an external disk drive. I used that computer to write fanfiction becuse I loved the keyboard.

And oh yes I wrote fanfiction. It was very cringy fanfiction but fanfiction nontheless. At some point I retired my old alias in favor of "Pyrex Shards." I now use 0xF21D in a lot of places but that's more of a convenience name than an alias, since it's shorter than my real name. I may write a short story in the future but that's just not in the cards right now.

I ventured through various fandoms over the years, from Rescue Rangers and Star Trek, to Sailor Moon, then to Hey Arnold and then finally to My Little Pony. But those interests have waned over the years in favor of other activities. Namely...

Cybersecurity/Infosec

In my professional life I work in cybersecurity. I specialize in threat hunting and incident response in a corporate setting. Previously I spent time as everything from a helpdesk technician, to desktop support, to server administration and I even spent some time as a Microsoft Active Directory domain administrator. I don't believe one should confine themselves to a single silo or lane in the world of IT, there's always room to learn more, but cybersecurity has become my focus over the past 5+ years.

Amateur Radio & Electronics

My amateur radio call is KJ5ELX (Kilo Juliet Five Echo Lima Xray)!

The amateur radio hobby has taken up most of my free time outside of work, where I spend much of my time on the air working to make QSO's (contacts) via a digital mode called FT8. I've managed to reach as far as Japan, Australia, China, New Zeland, Belarus, and many more countries using just 75 watts over the vertical antennna in my back yard here in Cypress, Texas. I'm pretty proud of this and am actively planning antenna upgrades to reach farther while I pursue my General class license.

One can't get into amateur radio and not also be an electronics hobbyist, and I'm pretty handy with a soldering iron, but am by no means an expert. I spend time playing around with circuits and building some simple boards that make lights blink. I'm also spending time repairing old radios.

Artwork/Poetry/Writing

When it comes to poetry and writing, I have written a lot of cringe but some of it may be good, or so I have been told. I'm slowly working up the courage to post some of my more obsure stuff on this site and my blog.

For the more visual side of my creativity, I have created a Redbubble storefront called FLZDesigns (the FLZ acronym is a secret for now). This kind of follows an obsession I have with stickers, and I started sketching my own characters in a unique enough style that I might be able to call my own. I have no art training so I'm doing all of this by the seat of my pants, and I'm finding it fun. I have a current project called Sugar Cookies that is availalbe there. Feel free to check it out!

Verifying my PGP Signed Messages

From time to time I may post messages and page updates that are signed with PGP. The following PGP signed message along with the links to my public key are available to help.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

I will be signing some of my messages with PGP. 

My public key is available at these two links:

My Website: https://roberthollingshead.net/pgp.html
Microsoft OneDrive Shared File: https://occurative-my.sharepoint.com/:u:/p/robert_hollingshead/EWdTa8tfe6VBlmm0AGm6PU0BWkxI49FlRCWKiX9Or_ZOGQ?e=28oioo
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----

iHUEARYIAB0WIQR8E96/RAiFR4WYgngCNKuuG0LyyQUCZMVBcQAKCRACNKuuG0Ly
yfyrAP4jlPEy8zJ6SecnZdm2ldarA8ayMGpEp6LFWejITq35qgD+LRMOtqz0Pfmy
mHTZFTNlhQ0HCnvFfC4omPq4aoBw5Ao=
=bHrx
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----