Why would you want to know anything about me? I am just a normal, semi insane, kinda weird boy who spends entirely too much time in front of computers for my own good, and the rest of it traveling, if I can manage it. That said, vital stuff:

I was born on mother's day (May 9) 1976. I am told that my parents were on their way to an expensive and elaborate mother's day dinner, when I started kicking and yelling from inside my mother's stomach. I guess I was hungry too. So yes, I was born at dinner time. Until recently, most of those who knew me would swear that there was some deep and abiding cosmic significance to that fact.

Last time I checked, there wasn't. The draft plan of my life is below... (ok, too much free time on my hands!).

So there is all you wanted to know about the Shawn timeline. It was with great pain and anxiety that I pulled up the page for my high school. *shudder*

I have done a royal ton of geeky science things. I will put those along with my degrees, etc, on the geek page. I was just thinking, I started that page when I didn't even have any degrees, back in like 1995. Wow. Getting old.

Now that I am going on 12 years in college, I am supposed to be figuring out what I want to do with the rest of my life. Here is my best shot:

After I got home from my mission working with Korean people in New York for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I had a really hard time getting back into the pace of computer programming and memorizing the formulae of different minerals. They seemed really trivial to me after I had just spent two years helping and serving people. I knew I wanted to do some sort of work to help, but I was a scientist and wasn't sure what would be able to utilize my training. Before my mission, I had flirted with medical imaging physics, but it was just too detached from actually helping people.

What I realized then was that I wanted to be a Hydrogeologist and work with water resource issues in third world countries. On the ground, with the people, not in some UN office in Geneva or something! The way I look at it, it is almost impossible for people to have dignity if they don't even have clean water to drink. I see so much suffering in the world that I can't really look at myself in the mirror if I don't do something to help. Ideally, I would be able to work for UNICEF or some such international organization.

My PhD will be in Hydrology and Water Resources , so why am I doing a minor in Planetary Science? Well, since you can't really do a dissertation in "humanitarian work", I decided to do my research in something really fun. So I picked water on Mars, and it is very, very fun. Maybe I am nuts, but oh, well. It should not hurt me that much, water is water. The only difference is that we are looking at pictures and having to figure everything else out, and that is good experience for anybody! OH, and the gravity and surface pressure are different -- no big deal there!

I have been privileged to do a fair amount of traveling the world over the last five years. I am grateful beyond words for that privelege, and for how much I have grown as a result. Of all my travels, my favorite place by far is Cambodia. The temples are stunning, and the people are the most humble and kindest of any others I have met. The poverty there is greater than anything else I have ever seen, but in spite of it there is so much of laughter and joy. I think we often fall into the trap of forgetting that money does not equate to happiness.

The big obstacle in my life these days is my health. I have a chronic pain and fatigue condition, and it makes it really hard for me to live a normal life and so forth. So I don't know if I will have to give up my dreams of doing humanitarian work, but I am sure of one thing: the Lord knows exactly what I need to be doing, and will take care of me. I trust Him.,

That is about it....