Okay, I haven't blogged in a while...not because I haven't wanted to, but because I've been working (you know, that thing that pays the bills) and writing my next book (I've been exchanging chapters with tech editors). In between all that, I've been coding...and if I take this any further, I'm going to have to add a "really bad excuse" label to my blog.

So what exactly is a "blog tag"? To be honest, I have no idea. I first saw mention of it over on MySpace, so that should give you some indication of what it is. Now it's been picked up in the rest of the virtual world, even by nerds ("hey, I resemble that remark!") like us. So, my understanding from Richard is that I'm supposed to document 5 things people may not know about me, and then "tag" five other bloggers. Okay, here goes...

1. I attended the Virginia Military Institute for my undergraduate degree...by accident. I am a Navy brat, and was working toward an appointment to one of the federal service academies, and a high school counselor handed me an application to a small military school in the Shenandoah Valley. In fact, he gave me the last application in his folder, and didn't ask me to make copies of it. That's one of the things about my life that I would NOT change if I could.

2. While attending VMI, I ran marathons my senior year. Yes, looking at me, you'd never know that...according to many fellow Marines, I was "built like a brick sh*t house"...a physique not necessarily associated with nor conducive to marathoning-like activities. I first ran the Marine Corps Marathon in '88, with a finishing time of 2:57. This qualified me for the Boston Marathon, which I signed up for (that is, paid money) and ran...with a finishing time of 3:11. There's more to that story, but unless you attended VMI, it would neither make sense nor be funny. I ran that Marine Corps Marathon again in '89, while I was in The Basic School, and finished in 2:54. I still have all of my finisher medals.

3. In my first tour in the Fleet, I was in Okinawa for a year, stationed with MACS-4. This is the same sort of unit that Lee Harvey Oswald served in. I was a Communications Officer (MOS: 2502). While there, I studied Shorin Ryu, an Okinawan martial art. I'd like to study Akido and Krav Maga.

4. I have a horse, and yes, I ride. Western. Well, not so much "ride" in the traditional sense, like dressage, but more in the sense of "don't dump me off and I'll give you a carrot". I've even done this at a dude ranch, but the carrot thing didn't work.

5. I completed my master's degree at the Naval Postgraduate School, just prior to separating from the military. While there, I wasn't actively engaged in a whole lot (set up a 10Base2 network and connected the detachment to the token ring CAN), so I worked out quite a bit. At one point, I was doing 27 dead-hang, palms-facing-out pullups and ran the 3 mile PFT run in 17 minutes or less. I could bench press 360 lbs unassisted...and yet I was 5 lbs over the weight that the Marine Corps said I should be for my height. So I was placed on weight control, along with the Ho-ho and Twinkie bandits.

Now, on to the tagging...

Jesse Kornblum

Marcus Ranum

Dave Roth

Andreas Schuster

Robert "van" Hensing

Live long and prosper!