I've been into computers since some time in the 8th grade ('93-'94) when a friend gave me an old (even at the time) microchannel 286 running DOS 5 and Windows 3.1. I learned how to use it, broke it, learned how to fix it, learned how to get on the Internet with it, and just kept going from there. Since then I've dabbled in a lot of different aspects of computers, but never really focused on anything enough to be an expert. I know bits of C, C++, Perl, Java, HTML, JavaScript, SQL, 4Test, WinAPI, PHP, batch programming, shell scripting, and probably a few things I can't think of right now. I pick up whatever seems interesting to me at the time, and I keep learning until it's no longer interesting or useful. I have a Linux box (Fedora Core 3, presently offline) and a workhorse desktop running WinXP Pro (the least shitty version of Windows yet!).

I'm a fan of the concept of open source software, and I think it would be of great benefit to everyone from mainstream computer users to Windows gurus if that concept were more prevalent in the Windows world. As a result, if and when I reach a level where I'm writing my own Windows programs independently, I plan to make them available here, in both binary and source form.

I played pencil-and-paper RPGs weekly from the the summer of 1993 until I moved to Portland in late spring of 2005. I have yet to go looking for a gaming group here, and I'm not sure if I will. I've played AD&D 1st Edition (heavily modified), AD&D 3rd Edition, RIFTS, Living Steel, DeadLands: The Weird West, DeadLands: Hell on Earth, GURPS without rules or dice, Star Wars d20, and Mutants and Masterminds. Much as I'd love to create a shrine to my RPG characters here, I've noticed that when other folks do that, I usally don't give a damn. So I've decided that, rather than bore you to tears raving about the badass fictional characters I've brought to life around the gaming table, I'll simply type up some of the fiction I've written about them and add it to the Writings section. Coming soon, I hope. Additionally, much of the programming I do is oriented toward gaming. I have dice rollers and name generators in the works, in Perl, so I can integrate them into a web page when the time comes. I also have some ideas for PHP role-playing games and a Java remote RPG client for players who can't be at the gaming table -- like if they've suddenly moved to Portland. Check back in a year or three and see what I've got.

I am, of course, a fan of many typical geek shows and movies. Star Trek, Red Dwarf, Monty Python, Buffy and Angel, StarGate (both SG-1 and Atlantis), Monk, The Princess Bride, and The Last Starfighter are all favorites of mine. I haven't much to say on the topic, though. I watch, I enjoy, I move on. With the exception of Red Dwarf, of course. :)

I used to be a hell of a reader. When I was a child I'd go to the Sunnyvale Public Library once a month, pick out 30-40 books, and read them all in the four week time limit, then return them and repeat the cycle. I loved to read, and spent countless hours on the couch or in my bed or at the kitchen table reading. I read a 700 page fantasy novel (The Dragonbone Chair, in case you're curious) over the summer between third and fourth grades, and did a book report on it when school started. I was a reader. It was what I did.

Somewhere along the line, something changed. I stopped checking out books, I stopped reading, and I started spending all my time on the computer. I think there were a lot of factors involved: the appeal of the Internet, my bitterness over the required reading for school (which I frequently had no interest in, but was forced to do anyway), my general change in mentality as I became a teenager, etc. In any case, I stopped reading books for entertainment on a regular basis and used them primarily for information, if at all. Sad.

Cut to mid-to-late 1999. My friend Jason tried to get me to take a copy of Stephen King's The Stand that he'd had for a while. He told me what a great book it was and that he was going to make me take that copy, and I told him that I would never be able to find the time to read an 1100 page novel. He insisted that I take it; I insisted that I would not. He finally won by giving me a large hard drive at no cost on the condition that I also take the book. I took it, and read it, and it was good. That was what really started me reading again. For some time after that, I averaged a book a month, although my actual reading patterns were quite sporadic. My reading has since dropped off again. I think it's sad that I haven't regained my previous motivation to read, but a little reading is better than no reading at all. Below is a partial list of the books I've read since late 1999 because I simply felt like reading.

• The Stand
• Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
• Personal Finance for Dummies
• Illusions
• Lila
• Tao Te Ching
• Jonathan Livingston Seagull
• Neverending Story
• 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
• The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove
• Planet of the Apes
• The Last Starfighter
• The Princess Bride
• A Malady of Magicks
• A Multitude of Monsters
• A Night in the Netherhells
• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
• The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
• Life, the Universe, and Everything
• The Caves of Steel
• So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish
• Mostly Harmless
• The Motley Fool Investment Guide
• The Book of King Arthur
• Hercules & Other Greek Myths
• The Hobbit
• Ender's Game
• Speaker for the Dead
• Flowers for Algernon