"Well-rounded" is probably the best way to describe me. And I'm not talking physique here. I have done almost everything you can think of, from (in no particular order) driving taxis to gardening to washing windows to route sales to material handling to electronic assembly and repair to computer software development to shipping and receiving to order filling to mail handling to volunteering and on and on. I have learned a lot along the way. Experience is the best teacher.

I like to write. I have a blog I call baudrunner's space on which I post original and sometimes opinionated articles of interest about current advances in science and technology as well as my own theories concerning the nature of reality. I have used the handle 'baudrunner' since the days of DOS, when I used it to log into the popular bulleting board systems of the day from my PC XT to download prototype software onto my 360 Kilobyte floppy diskettes. Many of those programs were the actual forerunners of currently popular operating systems and software applications like Windows and Word Perfect. I once wrote a computer program to facilitate a student's essay and thesis production. It was a relational journal article database management system called Journal. I posted it on the BBS's and charged a courtesy fee of $25.00 for unlimited use. I earned zilch. Naturally. 'Hackers' by Stephen Levy is probably my favorite book.

I enjoy adding to my store of knowledge. I have described myself as having a gift for retaining interesting and compelling ideas and items but I have a notorious propensity for forgetting and neglecting almost anything else. I don't understand the concept of sending a thank you note when you have already thanked someone in person. I have a mild but annoying form of aphasia wherein I cannot attach a proper name to people, places and things unless I mentally form an obtuse and abstract association with them or make a deliberate attempt through forced memorization by way of mental repetition. It has a name, but it doesn't come to mind. I think in visual imagery and symbolic imagery. Einstein once said, "I value my gift of imagination more than I value my gift for acquiring new knowledge." I know whereof he speaks.

I live in Canada. This is not a matter of choice since I would probably be at least as happy back in the Netherlands where I was born and where I lived for the first seven years of my life. I have one tattoo. It is on my right shoulder - a rampant lion lifted from the seal of the province of Noord Braaband where I was born. I have turned him around to face the front. I fear no evil.

I am a published poet, in print and on audio for the sight-impaired. I also authored a technical manual which was published for use by faculty in the advanced segment of a Digital Electronics Course at the community college level. I have written a screenplay, a sci-fi novel, and a non-fiction work, all unpublished.

My passion is ...

writing.

I know too much about ...

it all.

My parents always told me ...

very little. They left me to my own devices.

My childhood ambition ...

was to turn eighteen.

My favorite memory ...

as a child is swimming and playing on the beach at Grand Bend during summer vacation.

Why I write ...

mmm. It's probably because I always have something to say and no-one around to hear it.

What I am reading/watching/listening to ...

the latest science news; CSI: Miami; Jazz on 91.1 in Toronto.

My first job ...

paperboy

My best moment ...

was when they sprung a seminar in the main auditorium at city hall for me when I thought that all I was going to do was to give a presentation to a few colleagues in a boardroom.

My inspiration ...

is nature.

Sciences > Astronomy What would happen to a dead body on Mars

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When astronauts explore Mars they will not survive without special suits to protect them against what is to all intents and purposes a hostile environment. Mars does not have a magnetosphere to protect it from radiation, or meteors and micro meteors, and while summer daylight temperatures are known to reach as high as 70 degrees Fahrenheit, or 26 degrees Celsius, the nighttime winter temperatures fall as low as -135 degrees Celsius.

It has become evident that dust devils are quite common on Mars during the summer months. These are not the whispy little whirlwinds of Earth's barren regi...

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