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Music: I'm an acoustic guitar player. I probably have more fun getting together with friends, jamming, strumming and singing old songs than just about anything else I do.
Scrabble: I'm a rated tournament Scrabble player. I play in the local clubs and attend several Scrabble tournaments each year.
Backpacking and Hiking: I love the sandstone canyon country of the Colorado Plateau and do just about all of my backpacking there (mainly southeast Utah). I especially love to go on long multi-week (nearly 2-month long) journeys through that magnificent country. I've done two of those so far and I think I have at least one more long hike left in me. I've also backpacked in the Grand Canyon over 50 times, but not so frequently these days as I'm more drawn to those sandstone canyons in Utah.
Native Plants: This ties in somewhat with my backpacking - I have a rule for my back yard that only plants that I've encountered and made friends with on hikes or backpacking trips are eligible for planting in the back yard. I've been creating a native plant landscape in the back yard and have slowly been surrounding myself with all of my plant friends.
Plate Tectonics: OK, that's a little strange to have as a hobby - but it mainly stems from a project I've been picking at bit by bit for awhile. I want to create realistic alternate earth-like planets. This is really more of an art project than a science project. I just think looking at a globe that the way the continents and land is arranged is intriguingly beautiful. And I love knowing the reason or function behind the configuration of land-masses, hence the study of plate tectonics. Then I want to create my own simulation of it to produce possible alternate Earths.
OOTP: this is strikingly similar to the way I approach OOTP. I like to simulate the grand sweep of baseball history but with a same-only-different approach and with completely fictional players. So instead of the alternate but plausible earths, I'm creating alternate but plausible baseball universes.
I'm also interested in OOTP as a simulation. For a long time I wanted to write my own baseball simulation and did quite a bit of research to lay the groundwork for this. I was thrilled to discover OOTP - which meant I didn't have to spend all of those hours trying to write my own simulation. But I do instinctively like to think about what's under the hood of OOTP.
One thing I hope I get around to some day is to try to write my own trading logic. I'm quite appreciative of how well OOTP does at this, despite the complaints, since it is a very difficult problem. But I do have a little bit of a background in AI (pretty rusty) and I always wanted to try my hand at tackling this. One requirement I would have is that the computer GMs would be able to easily explain the reason for each trade in terms that make sense strategically for their team.
And finally yes. I'll third or fourth or whatever we're up to the endorsement of Carl Hiaasen, and of mystery fiction and political thrillers also. I spend about four hours a week in the car for work and am always playing an audiobook along those lines... But Carl Hiaasen is my favorite.
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