105 things about me

My wife did a 101 things post on her blog. It is one of the funniest things I've ever seen her do. So I'm inspired to do one of the same. In the highly unlikely situation that you are reading this but do not already know me, then you will learn something about me. If you already do know me, then perhaps you'll find something amusing.

1) I stay up late or wake up at exotic hours of the day to watch Space Shuttle launches.
2) I truly believe in the exploration of space.
3) I think we're doing it all wrong. Give me a half dozen billion dollars and I'll show you how its done.
4) In addition to wishing I had my own space program, I wish I had my own secret army and underground hideout.
5) In many ways, I haven't grown up since the 6th grade.
7) In three years, I'll turn 40 and plan to celebrate at Bandon Dunes.
8) Or Pebble Beach.
9) My wife is my best friend.
10) I don't have a lot of friends. I only keep the ones I really like.
11) I'll always make you a drink of you come by. That includes coffee, if its the morning.
12) I believe that if you take care of the people you care about, they will take care of you.
13) I believe that my wife has the finest looking *** in the whole world.
14) I believe that you manufacture your own luck. Or bad luck, if that's the case.
15) I perpetually think that I want to sit around and do nothing but always feel better when I go out and do something.
16) Few things make me happier than sitting in at a bar with a beer, my laptop, and a WiFi connection, while getting paid for it.
17) I still enjoy sitting in a bar with a beer, my laptop, and a WiFi connection even while not getting paid for it.
18) I believe that doing improv comedy for two years was the best professional training I ever received.
19) Knowledge comes where you can find it. Never stop learning and you will never grow old.
20) Some people have addiction issues. I do too -- to learning.
21) My blog has just been crawled by Google and that makes me feel like I just won a presidential primary.
22) I plan to vote for Obama as much because he makes me give a damn as because I actually agree with him.
23) I used to be a Republican.
24) I rarely talk politics because I find most people just re-state their opinions while getting louder and louder and don't actually want to learn anything.
25) I enjoy observing human behavior.
26) No behavior is more amazing to observe than that of your child.
27) I feel guilty that I only got around to mentioning my daughter on thing number 26.
28) The Cat in the Hat irritates me but Fox on Sox is pure genius.
29) My favorite five books are Neuromancer, The Name of the Rose, The Fabric of the Cosmos, The Codebreakers, and On Food and Eating.
30) I never said my interests were mainstream.
31) My first encounter with the World Wide Web was in 1991.
32) Yeah, it was being served by Tim Berners-Lee's Next Cube.
33) My reaction was "This won't go anywhere."
34) I usually can admit my mistakes.
35) I've written a science fiction novel but couldn't get a publisher interested.
36) I wrote it three years ago and it is no longer science fictiony enough.
37) My next novel is going to be fantasy.
38) Kids have so much more imagination than adults.
39) My daughter manages to make up words and stories and pictures that beat anything I ever could come up with. And she does this every day.
40) Her favorite planet is Saturn. Mine is also Saturn.
41) I also have a favorite element, a favorite compound, a favorite airplane, a favorite moon, and several favorite cipher algorithms, although any of these are subject to change at any time.
42) My wife and I met because of a book about code breaking. She read it for school. I read it for fun.
43) I truly believe that Google has changed the world.
44) My one professional hero is Richard Feynman.
45) I try to eat healthy but find it a struggle. My co-workers always bring in cookies, banana bread, and exotic Polish chocolates.
46) I rarely eat beef, as much because I find it easiest to adopt a few simple rules (no beef, no cheese, no processed sugar, no refined wheat, no French fries) to help me eat healthy.
47) My favorite fish is seabass, followed by salmon.
48) I am tempted to find out just how long I could go eating nothing but sushi. I suspect it is a long time but suspect that I will be disappointed.
49) I prefer email to phone calls.
50) I type at 90 words per minute when I hit full stride.
51) I can easily drink eight cups of coffee in a day.
52) Realizing that your consumption of coffee meets most of the DSM requirements to be classified as an "addiction" is a scary thing.
53) I bring my own coffee and French press to work.
54) If I won PowerBall (one of the big ones), I'd buy a Gulfstream G650 jet and rent a dozen apartments in different countries and sublet the ones I wasn't living in a week at a time to travelers but otherwise spend a lot of time in different places.
55) I have an elaborate fantasy life.
56) Despite what that might make you think, I am very, very happy with everything about my real life.
57) I really believe that I am as phenomenally lucky as a man can be.
58) I know my wife loves me but I am just insecure enough that I try to always act like I am wooing her.
59) I know my daughter loves me but I never try to count on that love.
60) I enjoy riding the train in the morning and at night because it gives me time to think.
61) Sometimes I think about space, sometimes about airplanes, sometimes about my family, occasionally about work.
62) I have a miserable drive but a pretty decent pitching and chipping game.
63) I have played one par and one birdie hole in my entire life.
64) Sometimes, I think about packing it all in and tending bar, but I know I'd disappoint a lot of people.
65) That said, I love tending bar.
66) My favorite cocktails are the Sidecar and Manhattan.
67) My favorite bourbon is Maker's Mark not least because their parent company owns Titleist.
68) I was trying to learn to cook and then I married a chef and now I'm intimidated to make anything other than oatmeal.
69) But I've cornered the market on beverages at our house.
70) Food, drink, and hospitality are very important to me.
71) I easily resent people who take advantage of my generosity but don't worry, if you've ever been invited back, then you're not taking advantage of my generosity.
72) Sometimes I cry when rovers land on mars.
73) Sometimes I cry when I hear about small businesses with naive but well intended ideas that I believe are doomed to failure.
74) Of all my emotions, the one I struggle with the most is frustration.
75) I do not like men who put down their families just to make themselves sound better.
76) I have the utmost respect for my family and believe that they make me a better man.
77) My wife is the sexiest woman alive.
78) Yes, I know that number 77 and number 13 are very close to duplicates. She deserves it.
79) I believe that knowledge and strength and humor are as important to attraction as raw looks.
80) Compatible taste in food, approaches to snuggling, and phone manners are important too.
81) I would take up arms to defend my family.
82) Sometimes I think "Aah, those were the days..." about obscure topics like mainframe computers, supersonic airplanes, and muzzle loading rifles.
83) I collect airplane flight manuals. At last count, I have several hundred.
84) I also collect design proposals for spacecraft, built and unbuilt.
85) If you have any, let me know.
86) I wish I had more time to balance the things I love to do and the things I need to do.
87) I require at about an hour of quiet downtime every day or I start to go a little funny.
88) I have found blogging to be the perfect activity to do when I have some quiet downtime.
89) I would be content if I had memorized every article in Wikipedia, but not for long.
90) I admire people who are masters of obscure specialties (like being the world's top expert on Niobium) but know that I could never be one of them.
91) Sometimes, I think I have Aspergers, but probably not.
92) I find it relaxing to memorize complex the arrangement of complex and interwoven systems like airplane flight controls, cryptographic algorithms, and battalion level military organizations.
93) I have a hard time remembering names.
94) I guarantee that I will think of things I want to add to this list and have a troubling existential crisis regarding the legitimacy of modifying a "things about me" list.
95) My Myers Brigs Type Indicator is INTP.
96) I really like psychological testing.
97) Most of the time, I'd rather be outside.
98) My favorite campgrounds are wooded, near water, and have a good firepit.
99) I like to travel light but find it hard to do so.
100) When I die, I hope that I will have helped people understand themselves and the world around them.
101) I strive not to be guided by regrets or fears but by the promise of what could be, but find it hard to do so.
102) I believe that knowing yourself honestly is the most useful kind of knowledge to put to use.
104) The best moments, after seven years of marriage, are the times when we are lost in conversation together just like on our first dates.
104) Sometimes alcohol is involved, but not always. And it definitely was on the first dates.
105) I will pretend not to care what other people will think when they read this list, but will honestly think about it a lot.