 |
Books |
My name is Mark Muller. I am a 41 year old airline pilot
by profession. I was born and rais
ed
in Aliquippa Pennsylvania. I received a Bachelor of Science degree
from the United States Air Academy in Aeronautical Engineering in
1983. I then went on to Undergraduate Pilot Training and completed
that in 1984. From 1984 until 1987 I flew the C-21 at Andrews Air
Force base transporting high level Department of Defense personnel.
I then flew the C-5 Galaxy ( at the time the world's largest aircraft
) from 1987 until December 1990. I flew many missions to the middle
east in Operation Desert Shield. I have been a commercial airline
pilot from 1991 until the present.
Even though I exercise; I have always been heavy. While in the Air Force my weight was always approaching, and sometimes over, the military weight limits. Little allowance was given for muscle, so I spent a lot of time on diets.
Before leaving the Air Force I was strictly dieting. I had heard the airlines would not hire fat guys. I was on a very low fat diet during this time. I had intense cravings. Several times I would fly a 16 hour mission to the Middle East and spend 15 ½ hours thinking about a pizza. In all I lost about 35 pounds.
This is where my interest in nutrition began. Even though I do not have a degree in nutrition, I have read many books, and have substantial personal experience with diet, nutrition, and exercise.
My computer programing knowledge also came through self education. I have always been technically oriented. At the Academy, in my only course in computer programing, we used punch cards to write our programs and the Borroughs computer filled an entire room. It was quite arcane and I had little interest in it at the time. But as time went on and computers shrank my interest grew.
In the mid 1990's my company was furloughing pilots, and being a relative new hire I had poor seniority and feared I would lose my job. If I did loose my commercial pilot job I did not want to go back into the service, I felt it would be moving backwards in life. This is when my two interests merged. I had flown with another pilot who was taking a computer with him on trips and writing software on his layover's ( time off while on trips ). This seemed like a fantastic idea, it was something I could do while still flying and I would be using my time off productively.
So I began to teach myself how to write software for Windows. I talked to different people read several books and learned how to program using a computer language called Microsoft Visual Basic.
The first program I wrote I called Fitness Calc ( I no longer sell this ). It estimated your percentage body fat based on some measurements taken with a tape measure. I put it on AOL and soon had my first $15 sale. I was thrilled.
Next I thought it would be neat if a program could estimate the calories in a recipe and display the information just like it is presented on food labels here in the US, the Nutrition Facts format. Recipe Calc was born. I learned from the internet about Shareware ( software that let you try it before buying ) and incorporated it in Recipe Calc. Sales were good from the start and continue to be. I know longer fear losing my flying job because I have now developed a new skill.
I still live in western Pennsylvania with my wife and son. And I still struggle with my weight. I have other hobbies now. I enjoy gardening now and I grow grapes and make wine every year. I also have started to grow Giant Pumpkins, my biggest so far was 796 pounds. I am also now teaching myself robotics.
Thanks for your interest in my software. I wish you health and happiness.
Mark Muller