I am a 42 year old man living a quiet existence in Chicagoland (the nickname for the city of Chicago and surrounding counties) with my much adored wife of five years in a house we built some four years ago, and still marvel at from time to time. I ended up here after proudly serving fifteen years in the U.S. Navy; Chicago is where I was offered a job as a Distributed Systems Engineer with EDS one of the nation’s largest Information Technology firms. That was 1995 and though I have jumped from job-to-job over the intervening years I have remained in Chicagoland because this is where my children are growing up; I have four, all girls and one (new) grandson.

My politics tend to define me at times—perhaps far too often; I am passionate about our Republic and the cause of (real) freedom and the equal protection of all American citizens under the law. What this means to me is that I tend to support equal rights for all; the right to marry someone of the same sex if so inclined; the right of women to have access to safe, legal abortion(s); the right to see my President without having to sign a loyalty oath first (my first loyalty is to the Constitution of the United States and the Republic for which it stands); I fully support the freedom of religion, but conversely, I should have the right to be free from religion as well, both publicly and privately. Lastly, I fully support the third branch of our government. The Judiciary serves a vital role in our Republican form of government, and despite Tom Delay’s rather distorted interpretation of the Constitution, it is not Congresses job to oversee the judicial branch; they are and should remain a co-equal branch of our local, state and federal governments.

I have been a member of the Epinions community since 2000, well December 1999, to be exact; I can’t even remember why I signed up, all I know is some 650 reviews later, I am still here and writing reviews. I enjoy the process, I enjoy the community, and I enjoy the people I have met here over the years. I have seen the site go through a lot of changes and I have hung in there; hey this is just getting fun, and I am not going anywhere. I have so much more the write and besides I am still waiting to be discovered.

Part of my persona is that of poet, and on a personal note I just published my first book of poetry entitled Romancing the Soul; Celebrating the Romance, Beauty, and Eroticism of Human Courtship. The book is sold at Amazon.com, Buy.com, as well as Borders.com, and is listed here on Epinions and two members have been gracious enough to review it. Thank you Jude and Stefanie for first, purchasing the book, and second for reviewing it. I am very proud of the book and hopefully I will be following it up with another in the near term…