Tell me about yourself

"Tell me about yourself" is a dreadful question that we were told to prepare for in a job interview.

This actually can be a deep and tricky question. So, what kind of answer do you expect? In a job interview you can say you are working for certain company and tell what you can do. In more social environment you can say where you went to school and where you work and what you like. Real philosophical folks will go into deep thinking mode and wonder who they are.
DesCartes would tell you "I think therefore I am".

Ok I'll tell you something about myself.

I live in Chicago, IL, USA (for 20+ years). I was originally from Hong Kong. I make a living as a computer programmer.

I went to college at Northwestern. I originally majored in math but found it too difficult at the Abstract Algebra class, so I switched to computer science (they called it computer studies back then). That Abstract Algebra professor was good. It was rare to find good English speaking math professor. But I still think that class was too hard. Although hardcore mathematics was hard, but I think it is only hard because the books are so hard. (more on this later)
I already had the instinct to be a programmer in high school. I can turn problems into code pretty quicker so majoring in computer science was the right thing to do. Despite NU is a pretigious school the CS department wasn't that great. I collected enough credits to graduate. I forever hated the computer graphics professor at NU. He simply taught with heavy accent and doesn't seem to care if anyone understand anything. He was a disgrace to Chinese, and he still hasn't replied to my email.

Later I realize how little I know after the degree at NU. I enrolled into a very-easy-to-enroll master's program at Depaul. They don't even require the GRE. At Depaul I was able to get top score in midterm and finals! I studied computer graphics. I find those various math techniques rather interesting.

I've been working for a programmer for 10+ years at various jobs.