A Grand Adventure

As many of you know, Caitlin and I have been planning to move abroad for quite some time. Over the last two years we’ve visited a lot of the places to which we’ve been considering moving. That only seemed like a sensible plan.

First we considered Portugal; while we both loved the climate, we felt like we’d be making it less affordable for the locals. Next we considered Ireland, absolutely gorgeous (especially when we stayed in a lighthouse) but we both love walking and Ireland has some of the most regressive walking legislation in all of the EU — you literally take your life in your hands walking beside the road there.

As an add on to our visit to Ireland last summer we visited Scotland and absolutely fell in love. You may not know this, but Scotland is even colder, wetter, and drearier than Seattle. What’s not to love? But the UK is a notoriously difficult place to get a work visa.

So we continued our search and ultimately settled on the Netherlands. The Dutch are welcoming² and they’ll accept Americans (there’s even a Dutch American Friendship Treaty which makes it super easy to become a permanent resident). Of course, to be really integrated one must learn Dutch, but that’s less difficult than learning Hungarian. ◡̈

We even had a Jira board set up for our move to the Netherlands in January, 2025. NERDS!

Then in May, we were in England to give a talk at SwiftCraft. There Caitlin ran into a recruiter from Goodnotes who was staffing their booth. While they were chatting she discovered Goodnotes was looking to hire an iOS Engineering Manager.

One thing led … slowly … to another and just last week I accepted a position as Engineering Manager at Goodnotes. They’ll be sponsoring our work visa for the UK and we’ll be moving to Edinburgh.

Maybe we’ll stay in Edinburgh. Maybe we’ll find another city in Scotland we like better. Who knows. But everything kicks off the beginning of September. I’m so grateful to have a partner beside me like Caitlin. I can’t imagine going on a grand adventure like this with anyone else.