Miscellany
There's nothing like a keen mind and a calm soul.
Biographical Highlights
Education
Loyola UniversityBachelors of Liberal Arts
Southeastern Univ. of La.
Graduate Student, English
La. Army National Guard
Sergeant, Field Artillery
Computer Skills
Below are a list of my computer skills.Primary Skills
Perl, MySQL, HTML, CSS, CGI, Linux, Win98/2k/NT, Apache, Networking, PC Hardware Maintenance
Other Skills
XML (XPath & XSLT), PHP, C, JavaScript, MS Access, sendmail, Sun Solaris, SCO Unix
Home & Workspace
I primarily live in Milan, Italy these days. I have a small apartment in central Milan and spend most of my day there--I work from home. If you'd like to see some photographs of my home and workspace, click on the heading of this paragraph.
On December 1, 2004, I was contracted by MySQL AB in Sweden, the makers of MySQL database software to develop content for a knowledge base for their MySQL Network clients. When I started, there were no articles, only an idea, a vision of what they wanted. Now there are over a thousand articles in the MySQL Network Knowledge Base. I've written over one hundred-fifty of them myself and have acted as editor for the others.
may 10, 2006
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About this Site
This web site is primarily about me, Russell Dyer. I'm a writer and I use this site to promote my writing activities. This includes fiction and non-fiction writing and editing. The site also includes photographs that I've taken in my travels around the world. These trips are sometimes related to my technical writing work, and they often influence my fiction writing. And all of these factors—my background, my work, and my travel, and so forth—influence what I muse about on this site.
About Russell
My full name is Russell Joseph Thadeus Dyer. I was born in New Orleans and lived most of my life there. My father was Brittish and Saxon in descent. He was a major in the Louisiana Army National Guard and a Lieutenant for the New Orleans Police Department, head of the Intelligence Division. He died of cancer when I was only three years old. My mother, of Sicilian descent remarried when I was seven and moved the family to Massachusetts for eight years before returning to New Orleans where she now lives.
As for education, I graduated from Loyola University in New Orleans primarily with a degree in English. I am now working part-time on a Master's degree in English, which I started at University of New Orleans, but later transferred to Southeastern Louisiana University outside of New Orleans in Hammond. As part of my requirements for completing my second degree in English, I am studying the Italian language in Italy.
With regards to employment, I worked for over ten years in the investment business in various roles from a clerk to a broker to a corporate executive. I have also worked in the software business for over ten years with some years overlapping my investment work, beginning in 1981 selling Tandy TRS-80 Model One—the start of microcomputers.
Although I have published almost one hundred computer articles, one book for the premier computer book publisher O'Reilly Media, I have not yet published any of my fiction work. This field is more competitive and I have not made sufficient time for developing or promoting my writings in this area. However, a few of my shorter pieces can be read on this site (see the short stories tab at the top). Additionally, I have written a humorous novel called In Search of Kafka, which I'm trying to place with a literary agent. The first and sample chapter of this novel about a character named Oliver Whitman also can be found on this site (see the novels tab). That novel basically finished, I've moved onto my second novel, Not a Step and expect to finish it by the end of 2007.
Now divorced, in 1981 I was married and had three children. Two of my children, my sons, are now grown and living on their own. The third child, my daughter (Marie) is living with her mother. After over 20 years of marriage, I am again single and am now living in Europe with my base in Milan, Italy.