It's Only Polite

I suppose it's only polite for me to say a little about myself. But what would the average reader of my blog (assuming anyone ever does read it) want to know about me? Or care about? Beats me, but here goes.

I was born in Flagstaff, Arizona, but I've lived most of my life in and around Phoenix, particularly the far west side of Phoenix. (Like all cities, Phoenix has areas that are alleged to be ritzy, areas that are alleged to be bad, areas that are alleged to be blue-collar and so forth. I come from the side that is alleged to be podunk.) I went to high school in Tolleson in the late 1970s, and as people who are familiar with the area can tell you, going to school in Tolleson in the late 1970s was not exactly like stepping onto the high-speed escalator to academic success.

The best job I've ever had was running a bulldozer in a landfill, only back then we didn't call them landfills. They were dumps. Nor did we call them bulldozers either. They were dozers or cats. There's something viscerally pleasing about crushing a bunch of TVs with a D7G that words simply cannot express. The worst job I ever had was managing a production line that manufactured collision avoidance systems for airliners. I'm not the management type. I may not even be a people person.

I am currently employed as a test engineer for a company that manufactures stuff for airliners. My job is making sure that the testing process guarantees that the stuff we ship works. Next time you fly on an airliner and you land at night or in bad weather, there is a small but non-zero probability that the instrument landing systems on your airliner were tested by my software. That may or may not make you feel any better...

I am married and I'm the stepfather of two twentysomething boys. That was something of a shock. One night I went to bed a single man with no kids, and the next day I had teenagers. Suffice it to say that a long period of adjustment ensued.

Politically, I tend to vote Democratic, which in a state like Arizona borders upon complete futility. I may as well cast write-in votes for Batman for all the good voting does me, but every election I return to my polling place with hope afresh. But I have to say I have respect for old-style conservatives, the kind of conservatives that were amenable to discussion, debate and compromise. I think if I were a conservative, I wouldn't be terribly pleased with my party leadership. But that's just my personal opinion - and since it's my blog, that's the last time I'll apologize in advance for having an opinion.

My favorite sports are probably drag racing, the World Rally Championship, the Dakar Rally, and in a subdued kind of way the Tour de France. I'm not a big fan of traditional stick-and-ball sports, though I do watch the occasional football game or basketball game on TV. I haven't watched baseball since the Arizona Diamondbacks won the World Series. Color me "fair weather fan", please. I also like to watch bull riding on TV, not because it resonates with me but because it anti-resonates with me. It is such a painful-looking spectacle I simply can't look away.

I like almost any kind of food so long as it doesn't involve arthropods or molluscs. I'm also not a big fan of olives or asparagus. I know people who go to various towns specifically because of the sea food, an attitude that mystifies me. It would be like me moving to the desert specifically because of the scorpions. I did move to the desert, but it wasn't because of the scorpions.

I'm quite an avid model-builder, and I find that I specialize in spacecraft models and aircraft of the Cold War for the most part. I figure I've spent approximately a billion dollars on kits, paints, tools and gewgaws over the years, and I can go through my junk box and find parts from models I built thirty years ago. I'm not sure whether that should please me or frighten me.

The Apollo Program was a life-changing event for me. I had just turned nine when Neil Armstrong stepped out onto the moon, just the right age for my Silly Putty-like brain to be forever deformed by the grainy TV coverage and Cronkite's avuncular commentary.

I smoke and I wish I didn't.

I run out of things to say after a while. I also tend to write overly long posts, it would appear.