OK, I'm going to stay here, but if you are following my stories, you might notice I've changed my screen name. Long story behind that, if meet IRL, I'll tell you about it over a cold beverage of your choice.

I do a lot of writing, mostly to express myself, and to get this stuff out of my head, and into a computer file. Normal people get an idea and write a story.

Me? It's more like, it seems like I have a cross-time scanner in m head, and I tune in on these characters talking to me. If I don't write their story, they keep insistantly yammerring until I do write it down. Trouble is, sometimes the signal fades in the middle of the story, and doesn't come back for awhile. So - I have a lot of story threads going at any given time, and I'll drop one for months or sometimes years at a time, while I might write 100 pages on a different one.

I started out writing fanfic, as I'm sure just about everybody does, but I'm trying to kick that habit. It is just not worth the effort.

So read, enjoy, And if you just want to leave some reviews, I'd really appreciate this, especially constructive criticisem. Traffic stats tells me lots of people are looking, lots of people are adding me to their ALERT lists and FAVORITE lists, but feedback is nice, too, you know?

Constructive criticism - I'd rather have a "I thought this was bad because -" and a good specific example of what you didn't like, that a dozen, "wow, this is great" reviews.

and a "you suck swampwater" is not very helpful if you don't tell me exactly WHY you think it is really bad. Of course - "I read 200 pages and I want the wasted time back" will make me laugh in your direction, if that is all you put. Or - an anonymous guest review - those really tend to make me get torqued - which tell me "this could never possibly happen" - when it not only could happen, it happened to ME - will really tee me off, OK?

On a different forum, I had an alternate History story where a character was discussing the forced relocation of Japanese Americans to Camps in Utah and Montana during WWII. I had a reviewer tell me that, "no matter how bad WWII got in the Alternate time line, the US would never do that." - sorry, Bubba, open a history book, it DID happen OTL.

And, I'll review other works, just not a real fan of High Fantasy or Romance Stuff. I like Hard Science fiction "with the rivets on" - and as you might notice, even when I try writing a little magic into my SF - it is still just a different form of Science...

I also like to experiment with characters from other cultures, and explore what happens when cultures collide - probably a result of my own upbringing, iin a family where my father was descended from a Scotsman who married into a Native American Tribe, and my Mother was Japanese, of an old Samurai family. My father was an Air Force NCO, and I had visited something like 15 countries and 34 states before i started Kindergarten. I spent 28 years in the US military, Seven in the US navy, as A Medical Corpsman, 21 in the Air Force, the last 18 of those years as an officer. I speak four languages decently, and three more well enough to get around.

Skill sets? One comment - often a complaint - is that my characters seem to be multi-talented, incredibly so. I personally don't think so, but then again, over the course of the last Sixty years, I have, at one time or another, harnessed a mule to plow a field, chipped flint arrowheads and axes - and used them to hunt. My grandfather helped me locate iron ore on his farm, and we took limestone and coal, to forge a Bowie Knife. I've welded with oxy-acetylene, Arc, MiG, TIG and I'm decent with a plasma cutter, I worked my way through college as a machinist. the Air Force gave me some instruction in taking care of both nuclear weapons and the Missiles and Aircraft that deliver them. I've got an Electrical Engineering Degree with a minor in Computer Science, along with a Master's in Management and I should be able to finish my second Master's in Education next year. As an Emergency Medical Technician, and as a Navy Corpsman, by the time I was twenty, I had already delivered three babies and zipped up more body bags than most people want to see in a lifetime.

So, no, I don't think my characters are geniuses or anything. They are no smarter than I am, and Lord knows, I am certainly no genius. i have met a few genius level people in my time, and I know I am not one of those people. But, at the same time, I can't see writing a story about a boring person. Why bother?

so, like I said, read, enjoy, comment - and if you've got some recommendations, PM and let me know, OK?