A requirement of most webpages is to explain a little bit about their creators, and, in the case of this website, that would be me. I am the Supreme Emperor. I believe myself to encompass all space and time, but my friends hold firm to the belief (mistaken as it may be) that I am currently seventeen and that I reside in a small double-residency dorm in Saint Louis.
I was born in the base hospital of George Air Force Base in California. Both of my parents served as noncomissioned officers in the Air Force. I lived about three miles from the airbase until it was deactivated by President Bush following Operation Desert Shield/Storm ("Gulf War" for all you civilians) in 1991.
After a two-month road trip through most of the continental United States, I moved to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. My mom had honorably discharged several years before and we remained at Dover until my dad retired in 1997.
We moved again, this time to Erlanger. My dad got a job as a quality manager for a subsidiary of Kodak. My mom works as an office manager for a flight academy near the Northern Kentucky-Cincinnatti International airport. This comes to my mom after years of working as a technician: first on F-4 Phantom II avionics, then medical equipment, and finally aircraft simulators. This experience makes her the most mechanically adept person in the house.
I attended Lloyd Memorial High School, the capstone of the Erlanger-Elsmere school district, for all four years of my high school "career." For as much bad press that Lloyd recieves in the local press and mindset, I did very well by it and am proud to be a member of its interesting, if not elite, corps of personalities. I graduated from Lloyd as its valedictorian and recipient of the John Uri Lloyd medallion, and will miss all of my classmates. Another transition--as the French say, "C'est le vie."
For my next trick, I am attending the Honors College of Saint Louis University--a great deal of it on the United States Air Force's dime thanks to a ROTC scholarship. Of course, the Air Force then holds me in indentured servitude for four years after I get my degree in Aerospace Engineering, but I find that serving my country is an exceedingly small price to pay for a quality education. Additionally, as a result of my upbringing into my parents' codes of honor and citizenship, my tour(s?) in the service will make me feel like a better citizen. Before I get any hate-mail calling me a fascist, let me quote the Latin proverb No estibus desputandem (there is no disputing taste, usually misinterpreted as no accounting for taste).
In addition to standard school-based achievement, it has been my pleasure to participate in extracurricular scholastic activities. In the fall of 2000 I went to the National Young Leaders Conference in Washington, D.C; in the summer of 2001 I went to Spaceset (a space colony design activity) at the Jet Propulsion Laboratories in Pasadena, California as well as the Governor's Scholars Program at Centre College in Danville (affectionately called "D-ville" to make it sound far more urban than it really is) and the Global Young Leaders Conference at the United Nations Building in New York City. Yes, I am, unfortunately, bragging. I am quite sorry and shall cease.
I have been told that I can do anything I really want. Somehow, I'm good in math and science as well as reading and history. The only thing I scholastically hate is poetry. Imagery has a tendency to confuse me and I couldn't care less about the meter that poems are written in. Iambic pentameter, trochee sextameter, I really do not care. Suggestions for what I should be when I grow up have ranged from teacher to lawyer to politician to cartoonist to philosopher writer to astronaut.
My hobbies include wargaming, philosophy, military technology, history, and creative writing.
I dislike popular culture except when I like it (hmmm... a truism?). I like techno, being a long-time fan of Tangerine Dream, Orbital, and Spacetime Continuum. I also like "Weird Al" Yankovic. On the motion picture front, I like such sci-fi classics as "2001" and "Blade Runner" as well as the samurai movies "Sanjuro," "The Seven Samurai," and "Rashomon." I also have an interest in Mel Brooks comedies ("The Producers," "Young Frankenstein," "Blazing Saddles") as well as "Dr. Strangelove." In books, I read 1984 in sixth grade for a book report and have always liked science fiction and historical fiction. My favorite book at the moment is Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein.
If you have any questions, contact me.