- Joined
- May 20, 2015
- Messages
- 3,221
- Age
- 61
- Location
- St. Augustine, FL.
- Gender
- Male
- Religious Affiliation
- Atheist
- Political Affiliation
- Moderate
- Marital Status
- In Relationship
I never actually posted an introduction topic when I joined. I met Romanos at the official modifications site for licensed vBulletin owners, and he hasn't been able to get rid of me since. 
My name is Mark, I am 51 years old, and I live in the oldest city in the United States, St. Augustine, Florida.
I was born in Chicago, Illinois and about 18 months later my family moved 300 miles to the south to Evansville, Indiana where I would be raised until I joined the U.S. Navy. I was sent to Great Lakes Illinois for recruit training (boot camp), and after completing a brief seamanship school, I was sent to San Diego, California to serve aboard the U.S.S. Bristol County, LST 1198. She was a Newport class tank landing ship, designed to carry some 400 U.S. Marines right up onto the beach, there to offload them and their equipment, vehicles, etc. As she was meant for beaching, she has a flat hull, and so could really rock in high seas. We called ourselves the "rock-n-roll Navy." I got to see many countries in the Far East.
While I was in the Navy, my family had moved to St. Augustine, as this is where my father was born and raised and he always wanted to return, as the northern climate and "Yankee attitudes" made him homesick.
Once I was discharged from the Navy, I came here to be with family, and worked various odd jobs, cooking in restaurants, construction, laying fiber-optic cable (I was part of a boring crew which bored tunnels under the railway crossings, got paid $2/ft, so we humped it! ). I eventually found myself working on a cattle/sheep ranch, and around this time the personal computer was becoming popular, and so I got one, and began to teach myself programming at night. I ingratiated myself with the owner of the ranch by entering the livestock into a database, so we could track age, number of calves (especially prized was knowing which cows had multiple births), pasture location, etc.
As I because more knowledgeable of the PC and MS-DOS, I began to get work helping people set up their PC's and writing apps for them. I quickly realized that knowing some math might make me a better programmer, so I enrolled at the local community college and got a degree in computer science, and took every math course they offered. I realized that I really enjoyed playing around with math, and knowing a bit about it really helped make me a better programmer.
Around this time, I got into keeping domestic fowl, including peafowl, turkey, chickens, guinea fowl, ducks, geese, swans. I have had several St. Bernards as pets, and they are such great dogs. I even had a male/female pair at one time that I bred. Quite an experience. I have always had at least one cat around, and have two right now named Alex and Newton, both females.
I worked for about 15 years as a free lance programmer, and retired. During this time, I was able to realize a life long dream of mine to get into performance cars, buying my first Camaro Z28 in 1999. A few years later I traded it in for a 35th Anniversary Camaro SS, which I still have, and have since modified quite a bit, and then about 4 years later, got a Corvette Z06.
I really got into it, joining forums and learning how to become an expert car detailer. But, my cars are no garage queens; I took some chances pushing these cars, and some might say I am lucky to be alive (my mother took out an insurance policy on me...). Don't get me wrong, I always felt in control, but I have had the Z06 north of 180 mph (that's about 290 kph). Anyway, I think I have gotten that out of my system, and for the last 5 years or so I have devoted much of my time to online math help. I had always kind of played with math all along, but this time involved helping online has really fortified my working knowledge.
At one math help site, I found it really stood out from the crowd because the administrators were present every day and took user feedback seriously. I began devoting the majority of my time there and worked my way up through the ranks until I was finally asked to join the administration team. So, I found myself back into programming, and a lot had changed...I had to learn HTML, CSS, javascript/jQery, PHP, MySQL as well as the extensive vBulletin AdminCP. As I found getting involved in math help sites fortified my knowledge of math, so too has being involved with the vBulletin modification site fortified by knowledge of creating add-on products for vBulletin.
I really look forward to being a part of the community here and learning more about Christianity.
My name is Mark, I am 51 years old, and I live in the oldest city in the United States, St. Augustine, Florida.
I was born in Chicago, Illinois and about 18 months later my family moved 300 miles to the south to Evansville, Indiana where I would be raised until I joined the U.S. Navy. I was sent to Great Lakes Illinois for recruit training (boot camp), and after completing a brief seamanship school, I was sent to San Diego, California to serve aboard the U.S.S. Bristol County, LST 1198. She was a Newport class tank landing ship, designed to carry some 400 U.S. Marines right up onto the beach, there to offload them and their equipment, vehicles, etc. As she was meant for beaching, she has a flat hull, and so could really rock in high seas. We called ourselves the "rock-n-roll Navy." I got to see many countries in the Far East.
While I was in the Navy, my family had moved to St. Augustine, as this is where my father was born and raised and he always wanted to return, as the northern climate and "Yankee attitudes" made him homesick.
Once I was discharged from the Navy, I came here to be with family, and worked various odd jobs, cooking in restaurants, construction, laying fiber-optic cable (I was part of a boring crew which bored tunnels under the railway crossings, got paid $2/ft, so we humped it! ). I eventually found myself working on a cattle/sheep ranch, and around this time the personal computer was becoming popular, and so I got one, and began to teach myself programming at night. I ingratiated myself with the owner of the ranch by entering the livestock into a database, so we could track age, number of calves (especially prized was knowing which cows had multiple births), pasture location, etc.
As I because more knowledgeable of the PC and MS-DOS, I began to get work helping people set up their PC's and writing apps for them. I quickly realized that knowing some math might make me a better programmer, so I enrolled at the local community college and got a degree in computer science, and took every math course they offered. I realized that I really enjoyed playing around with math, and knowing a bit about it really helped make me a better programmer.
Around this time, I got into keeping domestic fowl, including peafowl, turkey, chickens, guinea fowl, ducks, geese, swans. I have had several St. Bernards as pets, and they are such great dogs. I even had a male/female pair at one time that I bred. Quite an experience. I have always had at least one cat around, and have two right now named Alex and Newton, both females.
I worked for about 15 years as a free lance programmer, and retired. During this time, I was able to realize a life long dream of mine to get into performance cars, buying my first Camaro Z28 in 1999. A few years later I traded it in for a 35th Anniversary Camaro SS, which I still have, and have since modified quite a bit, and then about 4 years later, got a Corvette Z06.
I really got into it, joining forums and learning how to become an expert car detailer. But, my cars are no garage queens; I took some chances pushing these cars, and some might say I am lucky to be alive (my mother took out an insurance policy on me...). Don't get me wrong, I always felt in control, but I have had the Z06 north of 180 mph (that's about 290 kph). Anyway, I think I have gotten that out of my system, and for the last 5 years or so I have devoted much of my time to online math help. I had always kind of played with math all along, but this time involved helping online has really fortified my working knowledge.
At one math help site, I found it really stood out from the crowd because the administrators were present every day and took user feedback seriously. I began devoting the majority of my time there and worked my way up through the ranks until I was finally asked to join the administration team. So, I found myself back into programming, and a lot had changed...I had to learn HTML, CSS, javascript/jQery, PHP, MySQL as well as the extensive vBulletin AdminCP. As I found getting involved in math help sites fortified my knowledge of math, so too has being involved with the vBulletin modification site fortified by knowledge of creating add-on products for vBulletin.
I really look forward to being a part of the community here and learning more about Christianity.
Thats a BEAUTIFUL car!!!!!!!!!!! 
