I figure since I don't know anyone here that I can get an honest opinion and some constructive criticism from y'all.

http://www.jaxcoder.com

Thanks
Mike

Since I'm new on here and don't know any better, I'll give you my gut reaction. Most of my ideas of good site design come from bad site design at Vincent Flanders' "Web Pages That Suck" (http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/"). I don't know if, on this forum, he's considered an idiot, a genius, or what, but his site makes me laugh - and makes sense.
Your site is good because:
1) Has easy navigation - I know what I'm getting before I click on the navigation menu and the choices are clear and self-explanatory;
2) It doesn't take me longer than 4 seconds to figure out the purpose of your website - you're putting yourself out there for potential employment and/or getting back into the IT business, it would seem from your listing of articles, talk of GUI design and C#, in addition to the dedication to your brother;
3) The site seems to be valid XHTML 1.0 and CSS, although I'm just relying on a Firefox plugin for that;
4) Nothing flashes, pops up, resizes the browser window, or otherwise acts rudely, and the site has a good color scheme and provides reasonable (readable) contrast on screen;
5) The site loads quickly, without waiting for images.
Your site might be better with:
1) Touching up some of the hyperlinks - the font size, or maybe the font family, for some of the links (see the articles page) in the middle of a paragraph is different from the text around the link (that's pretty nit-picking, I know, but having the hyperlinks underlined and in blue is contrast enough from the rest of the text - the font size/family difference isn't visually appealing);
2) A good point on your "Contact Me" page is having your links open in a new window (or tab) so people aren't redirected away from your site;
Overall, I don't see much room to complain without knowing any specific goals for the site or your target audience. Looks like a nice design that clearly communicates what the site is about with visitors.

bpb,

Thanks for your input, much appreciated.
I had about given up thinking that my site was so screwed up no one wanted to comment on it.
I've asked others to give me feedback but as you can see by my "Contact Me" page I didn't get much in the way of help.
I will address the hyper links and upgrade some time today.

Again thank you for taking the time!
Mike

No problem; I've got a website design project I'm working on myself so I'm looking at others - helps me out as well. As far as your site goes, I really can't see much wrong with it without knowing exactly who your target audience is. If you're really job hunting through the site, or interested in getting more resume attention (although the "Resume" nav button was an immediate clue that's what you were partly doing with the site) you might rearrange the content. But aside from tailoring it for a more specific audience (which is something you yourself would know) I don't see anything technically wrong or aesthetically obnoxious with it. Maybe that's why you haven't gotten much feedback - already a good job!

Overall the site skin and everythign looks good. As stated prior to this post the navigation is good and easy to use. The only issue that I have with the site (and this could possibly just be me) is that the banner/ top image seems to be 150 - 200px tall and, at least on smaller screen sizes wastes a lot of vertical space on an image.

As stated, good site.

I appreciate your input. I just completely overhauled the site and just got it up this afternoon.
About the banner...yeah it is pretty big, I'm just learning Photshop and am unartistic as hell so at this point I'm just toying with it. Hadn't really considered what it would look like on a smaller screen...thanks.

Appreciate your time
Mike