Hi, this is Bill Andrews, latest addition to the Astronomy staff and (I hope) author of several subsequent blog posts here. Before I dive right into any celestial happenings, I just wanted to give a little bit of my background and what it's like behind the scenes here at Astronomy headquarters.

Although you wouldn't know it to look at me (or read my name), I'm actually a native Puerto Rican, born and raised in a tropical paradise. I also lived in the Seattle and Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, areas before going to school at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston. Unlike most of my engineer friends in college, I realized I liked writing about science more than actually doing it, and I ended up graduating as the only writing major in my class.

To better work on the language side of things, I decided to go for a master's in journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I just graduated 2 months ago and somehow in this economy managed to find not only a paying job, but one doing exactly what wanted: reading and writing about science.

And not just any science, but my favorite one! Whether beneath the sunny skies of Puerto Rico or the snowy ones of Wisconsin, I've always loved space and wanted to know all I could about what lay out there. I particularly enjoy the exploration of our solar system, as well as the crazy physics found near black holes and intuited (someday) from dark matter. I'm not too familiar with observing yet; but I can't wait to get behind a telescope and put some of my co-workers' tips to good use.

So, as I continue picking up the tricks of the trade at Astronomy, I'll post on the latest in space — and maybe a little on what it's actually like working here.