Literature? O nce upon a time there was a boy who loved to learn. Through the first 18 years of his life and schooling he was quite simply a sponge, drinking deeply from all the pools of knowledge to which he was exposed. With an especial penchant for chemistry and computer science, he went off to college to extend and expand his expertise, and after another decade in academia found himself near to earning the highest degree the world had to offer. But a strange thing happened to the boy. He found that no matter how much information he managed to soak-up, the pool never, ever shrank; to the contrary, it's shores pushed outward! A sponge totally saturated with water, tossed into the sink, will drink-up no more liquid: such was the feeling the boy began to experience. The sponge must be wrung dry before it can process more water. The boy, too, found that he needed time and activities away from his learning in order to digest and continue the process of his education. Thus did a young scholar of science, unversed in the intricacies of fiction, drawing merely on his own (admittedly) meager skills and somewhat more hefty imagination, embark on a quest to sate his need for periodic wringing-out...

	Thesis: Completed and Published A s 2005 was ending I at long last presented my dissertation defense to my thesis committee and a small audience of my peers. After six (more or less) years in residency at the University of Delaware Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, I answered audience questions as well as the more pointed questions of my committee, and was rewarded with some handshakes and pats on the back: a job well done. Five months later, in April of 2006, the 200+ pages documenting my research for all eternity was completed and submitted for publication. The bound, hardcover copies are due to arrive any day now...