Patricia Daukantas, Science/Technology Writer and Editor

Greetings! I'm Pat Daukantas. After years of pursuing degrees in journalism, physics, and astronomy, I quite naturally fell into a career in science writing and editing. A few years at a scientific magazine, Computers in Physics, morphed me into more of a technology journalist. As of this latest Web-site update -- early winter 1999 -- I've been on the staff of Government Computer News for about six months now. I cover the vast world of "enterprise computing" as performed by the federal government.

Some bits about my less-than-conventional career path: As a kid, I was fascinated by "space shots" from Gemini 3 onward, and I tried to organize my fifth-grade friends into a "science club" so that we could collect tadpoles. In my teen years Watergate obsessed me, although I did take one high-school computer class that involved programming an old PDP-8 in a language called FOCAL. (We saved our programs on punch tape!) In college I pounded out my stories and term papers on various manual typewriters. Once I reached my late twenties, I reached an epiphany: I was spending my free time reading about science, I had such great grades in math and science back in high school -- maybe there was a side to my brain that I had been ignoring for many years! Thus, in the tradition of "The Road Not Taken," I took a side trip through western Massachusetts, the plateaus and mountains of southern Arizona, and finally to Maryland.

Here are a few Web sites you might find of interest:

I used to have a Web page called "Cicely's Cafe," which I created when I was smitten with the TV show Northern Exposure in the early 1990s. Unfortunately, the page (and my wam.umd.edu account) were deleted when I finished my master's degree at the University of Maryland. To make up for this loss, I've created a brief essay describing how I used to feel about the magical world of Cicely, Alaska.
I am a proud veteran of the Daily Free Press, which is now online.
My interactive resume, if you have any interest in that sort of thing.
My admittedly incomplete online bibliography.
Page of my favorite Web links.

A few other (and not-so-professional) facts about myself: I'm a proud native of Massachusetts, but I've been living just outside Our Nation's Capital since 1992. I enjoy hiking and downhill skiing. My aging, arthritic dog, Brandi, died in May 2001 but lives on in my heart -- FINALLY, here is a picture of her and a friend's dog, a Westie named Max.

Thanks for visiting my small piece of cyberspace!