Marissa Yuen is passionate about building new user interfaces, improving user experiences, and implementing beautiful designs with equally beautiful markup. She enjoys learning new things, whether it’s an unfamiliar language, a new frameworks, or an existing applications.
She and her family make their home in Arizona. In her spare time, Marissa can be found working on DIY home projects and learning more about interior design, playing video games, and splashing in the pool with her family.
Most importantly, her sarcasm and dry humor keeps us laughing on a daily basis!
I recently asked Marissa to share a little bit more about herself:
1. You got married this summer! What has been your favorite part of married life so far?
My favorite part of being married to Paul is knowing I have a best friend for life and that our shared goal of making everything around us better will lead to many adventures.
2. How did you get started as a software developer? Was it something you always knew you wanted to do, or did you happen into it?
My older brother got a copy of HTML for Dummies from a summer internship in 2003. I picked it up to learn how to make a hobby website and have pretty much known since the first cringe-worthy table-based layouts I wrote that I would pursue web development in some capacity. Hobbies come and go, but my appetite for learning how to build things on the internet has been pretty insatiable for over 15 years now.
3. What’s your favorite movie?
I don’t think I can pick a single favorite movie. I love just about anything in the sci-fi / fantasy genre. My favorite movie of 2019 so far was Avengers: Endgame. But Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is coming up, and I’m pretty sure that will top anything I’ve seen in a while.
4. Because no Q&A is complete without this question … If you could invite 6 people, living or dead, to a dinner party, who would you choose?
I spent way too much time thinking about this, so I’m just going to say my five siblings and Paul, because that would be a super great party.
5. What does a typical day look like for you?
Morning coffee; work; usually breaking for lunch around the time my stepson gets home from school; finishing work; then dinner and family time in the evenings. Aden has a growing love of video games, so that has been a really fun thing to do all together lately.
6. What was your favorite part of being homeschooled? Least favorite?
My favorite thing about being homeschooled was the way it developed my natural curiosity and love for learning. My least favorite part was never having snow days.
7. If you could only eat one food for the rest of your life, what would you choose?
My husband makes a mean ribeye steak and I’m pretty sure I could live on that forever.
8. Which Agathon team retreat destination has been your favorite? Why?
Again, it’s really hard to pick one, but France is at the top of my list mainly due to where we lodged in the countryside, surrounded by vineyards and the ochre cliffs of Roussillon. The nearby villages we visited were all equally picturesque, and I felt like I could explore them forever. The food, of course, was also incredible.
9. What’s the most recent app you downloaded? Which apps do you use the most?
The most recent app I downloaded was Kasa for managing TP-Link smart switches. My most-used apps are Spotify, Dropbox, and Firefox.
10. What is your favorite part about working for Agathon?
My favorite thing about working for Agathon is that we aren’t tied to any one tech stack; we use what’s best for the client and the project. That means I get to learn a ton of things and no tool or language is automatically ruled out before a project begins.
With 10 years of experience as a professional blogger—and as a former Agathon hosting client herself—Mandi’s passionate about the good work Agathon does and sharing that message with more people.