My alter ego stunt seems to have worked. I knew Sam would get it because I used my correct email address when I logged on to the chat. He even commented on it on the chat yesterday and a few people picked up on it. It was a time when the chat room was very busy, so it slipped right on by and may not have been noticed by some of the chatters. I even ignored Sam's comment myself, because I was involved in another discussion.

I think the alter ego was on the chat more than the forum, partly because I messed up and some forum posts never made it. But he chatted with several people that I have had long discussions with and they didn't have a clue.

Speaking of clues, I created an alter ego who was somewhat like me. He was born in the 1930's in Kentucky, just like me. He is also retired and rides a motorscooter. He lives in Florida near where I lived when I was a teenager. But I gave him several charactistics that were very different from me. I made him a salesman, but I couldn't sell steam heat to an Eskimo. He is Hispanic and I am of English ancestery. And he fell off his motorscooter. That's something I haven't done in almost 50 years.

I almost got in trouble once. He got some replies in Spanish! I don't exactly have command of the language, so he had to be a Hispanic who understands Spanish, but doesn't speak it very much.

Believe me, typing with a Spanish accent is not easy, however, I have a Peruvian son-in-law so I used some of his speech patterns. For example, he uses very few contractions, saying "I cannot," where I would have used "can't."

Thanks for all the compliments. Several people thought my alter ego was one of a number of very intelligent people. I'm sure Julio would have been amused.

I had a great deal of fun with it and I may do it again sometime, but not anytime soon.
Howard