I do spend a lot of time at the computer doing various things. Now that I have landed a 64 bit speed demon, I can keep a couple of dozen windows open and not lose a hiccup.

I'm not working full time. My full-time space design contract ended quite a while back, but the contractor continued paying me for much of last year (about half my usual amount) to be available for a couple of short projects a month. Kind of a "retainer" so I didn't go anywhere else, I guess.

Contract finally ended completely, and I'm gainfully employed now as a househusband and hopeful novelist until the next contract comes along. My wife is a medical professional and pulls down pretty good money. Half pay wasn't too bad. I actually got a tax refund for 2008 for the first time in years!

Probably a good thing. If I were at peak pay right now, we'd be getting close to that income death ceiling Obama's setting up.

But the fact is this isn't that much work. A good research post takes maybe fifteen minutes tops. I know where the information is and I know how to find it. It doesn't hurt that most people here keep repeating the same canards over and over again. Maybe I should number my responses.

Really. Try and find examples of somebody countering me with something along the lines of "No, Tom, if you look here, you'll see that you dropped a decimal point," or "That guy never actually said that. See? This link shows what he really said."

When somebody shows me better information, I concede. When I posted a bit on floating sensor buoys indicating the ocean cooling down (a story that got wide circulation), somebody (I forget who now) posted that Josh Willis, the scientist, had traced this back to a sensor mistake, not an actual temperature reading. That was true, and I not only corrected myself, I had a nice e-mail conversation with Willis on the subject.

Kind of flattering, really. The people at the old Kevin Drum board were convinced that the national Republican Party was paying me full time.

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Shorter answer: I can do this because I'm smarter than you. ;)