I was born February 12, 1968 in Nairobi, Kenya. At
the time, my dad was working as a consultant in range management for
the Agency for International Development (AID). We lived in the town
of Embu, along the slopes of Mt. Kenya in the Eastern Province. Then,
when I was two years old, we moved to Gainesville, Florida. So my
memories of Kenya are not particularly clear!
During the eight years that my dad taught at the University of
Florida, the most important time to me was the three years that we
lived near the small town of LaCrosse (north of Gainesville). There we
had our cattle ranch, a bunch of chickens, and lots of fresh
vegetables from the garden. Of course, getting up early to feed the
animals before school on a cold day wasn't always fun. But me and my
brother could always have fun exploring in the swamp or having 'cow
pie fights'. And my mom would make plenty of special food that you
just can't get in most restaurants (whether she liked it or not), like
'Rocky Mountain oysters', fried rattlesnake, armadillo, elderberry
jam, somosas, sopaipillas, hog head cheese, and tongue sandwiches. It
was also during this time that I made the most significant decision of
my life by accepting Jesus Christ as my personal savior and lord,
while attending Antioch Baptist Church.
In the spring of 1978, my family pulled up stakes and headed for
Texas, so that my dad could get out of the rat race of the university
for a while and back to more practical involvement with ranchers.
While he was the range management extension specialist in Uvalde,
Texas for about 20 counties, I got to see a very different world.
Besides the fact that it didn't rain every other day, we were close to
the border with Mexico and at the edge of the Texas Hill Country.
Florida hills just don't compare! The beautiful spring-fed rivers of
the area and my involvement in Scouts made it only natural for me to
get interested in canoeing. There were also opportunities for hunting
(mostly deer) and exposure to lots of good music.
After graduating from high school, I ended up going off to Texas A&M
University, basically because they offered me a nice scholarship. Like
most beginning college students, I wasn't sure exactly what career to
go into, just that I liked math and physics. So I ended up getting a
B.S. in Math, with lots of physics courses along the way. I also got
involved with Campus Crusade for Christ, and the India Association
while I was at A&M. And the football games were great! Gig'em Aggies!
The last year of my undergraduate study made it clear that pure math
or physics was not the direction for me to continue in. So I found
myself entering graduate school at A&M in Meteorology. This was an
exciting time of learning new things as I completed my M.S. under Dr.
Steve Lyons. Although my thesis involved using 'empirical orthogonal
functions' (EOFs) to look at patterns in daily Texas rainfall, I also
got some exposure to pollution dispersion modeling for an
environmental impact assessment.
As if I hadn't tortured myself enough with school by this time, I made
the move to Florida State University to begin my Ph.D. in Meteorology.
Under the world reknowned modeler of tropical meteorology Dr. T.N.
Krishnamurti, I was finally able to combine many of my varied
scientific interests into a modeling study of the impacts of
vegetational variations on global climate modeling. Of course, being
in Tallahassee was sort of like being back in my old childhood home,
except for the adjustment to life in a 'big' city. After finishing my
Ph.D., I worked at the Center for
Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies (COAPS) at Innovation Park (FSU's
research park) under Dr. J.J. O'Brien. On November 14, 1998 I escaped
the "freedom" of single life when I married Nancy MacMinn of Bathurst,
New Brunswick, Canada [pretty picture not scanned in yet]. I also
moved back west a ways to Jackson, Mississippi. Since December 1998 I
have been teaching meteorology at Jackson State University, while
continuing my research efforts on various fronts.
More information about my work is available on my
resume.
Personal Interests
My interests include canoeing, hiking, music, religion, languages,
travel, and history.
Some links of interest:
"Perspectives on the World Christian Movement"
Tallahassee Area Church News
Tallahassee Bible
Institute's Center for Biblical Studies
Northwoods Baptist Church
(Tallahassee)
U.S. Center for World Mission
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