Will this snapshot scare bugs away?

Self-deprecating humor in the caption of my mugshot aside, this selfie allows you to understand why I often characterize myself as just another chubby white guy.  The double-chin you see in the selfie is not a mere artifact of the snapshot.

If any of you are offended by my use of the word, “chubby,” I humbly ask you to consider that some adjectives are simply offered up as descriptors.  More to the point, just because someone invokes an adjective like “chubby,” “skinny,” “tall,” “rather short,” “obese” or even “unattractive” does not automatically mean that someone uses those terms in a pejorative sense.

But I digress.

So…I am a slightly overweight middle-aged Caucasian male.  I served in the US Navy for six years in the late 1980s.  I helped operate nuclear reactors as a nuclear-trained Machinist’s Mate/Engineering Laboratory Technician.  I re-entered civilian life before seeing any combat in the First Gulf War.  Because I am a “peacetime sailor” sort of veteran, I do not deserve the praise often poured upon veterans.  Especially when so many veterans saw more hellish combat in a day, week, or month than I experienced during my six years on active duty.

Indeed, I don’t always feel entitled to being thanked for my service:  my only sacrifices in the service to my country were mere inconveniences to my comfort.

Since re-entering civilian life over 30 years ago, I’ve earned a living apart from the nuclear power industry.  I was good at the Engineering Laboratory Technician’s job, mind you, I just didn’t like working in the nuclear power field as much as I thought I would.  In civilian life I enjoyed a varied career.  I was “a jack of all trades, an expert in none” for over a decade after my honorable discharge.  My civilian career culminated with being a departmental Help Desk/Network Administrator/Computer Support Technician in the University of Virginia’s then-named Office of Development and Public Affairs.  (The current reorganized/renamed department is now the University Advancement Office and University Communications.)

I was forced by my health to take a medical retirement from UVa in mid-2013.

I have been tremendously blessed by being happily married for 20 years.  (I married late in life.)  It is not hyperbole to assert that with respect to my wife, I am the most blessed man on God’s green Earth.

Oh, and for the curious, I pronounce my last name “good.”  That is, my last name rhymes with “wood” not with “food.”

Thanks for reading.  Cheers.