Hello my name is Dennis Baker. I am the "mastermind" behind this web page and this particular page is my biographical information. I was born in Wiesbaden, Germany on April 24, 1963. My father (Donald Baker) was in the military (Army, making me an army brat), he was obviously stationed in Germany when I was born, so I am an American citizen by birth. I have never seen my birthplace other than as an infant, and obviously I do not have any memories from that time. Somewhere along the lines I also lived in Okinawa for a year or so, but again it was before I was 5 years old, so I have only vague recollections of that time. I lived in Oklahoma for a period of time as that is where my younger sister was born (Dona Baker), but I have no recollection of that time either (I must have blocked it out, it is Oklahoma after all).

I had to work my way through college and held several jobs. I worked 2 years at the McDonalds directly across from the Zachary Building on the Texas A&M campus, until I was fired for insubordination! While working at McDonalds I met my future wife, Doris Baker. I was the crew chief assigned to train her, and let me tell you, I am still trying to train that damn woman! J I also sacked groceries at Kroger (ugh), and was the cook at a mom and pop faita joint. Then I landed a job busing tables at Pelican's Wharf (a steak/seafood restaurant). I guess I bused tables for 6 months or so before moving up to waiter - I remained a waiter until I graduated from college. It was at Pelican's Wharf that I met my best friend from college, Aubrey Hemphill. My lovely wife and I tied the knot at the All Faith's Chapel on the Texas A&M University Campus August 10, 1985.

In the early part of 1987 Sun Exploration and Production Company offered me a job working for them after I graduate .... I hopped all over it and it became very difficult to be motivated about finishing out my last semester of college. Fortunately, at the time Texas A&M had a policy that graduating seniors were exempt from final exams (that policy died a couple years after I graduated) and I managed to graduate with a very respectable 3.1. We rented a house in Irving, Texas for 2 years (1620 John Smith, about 10 minutes from Texas Stadium) before we found and bought a nice little house in Grapevine, Texas (about 10 minutes from DFW airport).

Shortly after I started working (1988) Sun Exploration and Production's parent company Sun Oil Company spun us off, making us the largest independent oil exploration company in the world. Of course our newly independent company wanted a new name and thus Oryx Energy Company was born. I worked for Oryx / Sun Exploration and Production 11 years, surviving something like 5 major reorganizations and layoffs before my department was "out-sourced" September 1, 1998 (the company had several thousand employees when I started and had maybe several hundred when I left). The company that got the contract to provide the "out-sourced" services was Affiliated Computer Services (ACS) - ACS hired me at a higher rate and left me in place ... so I was sitting in the same office, doing the same job, but getting paid more money by my new employer. Then in October of 1998 Kerr-McGee announced that they were purchasing Oryx Energy Company pending shareholder and SEC approval. In February 1999 the purchase was finalized and Oryx Energy Company no longer existed and Kerr-McGee became the 3^rd largest independent oil company in the world. Then in June 1999 ACS decided to shuffle me off to another one of their organizations, so I became an employee of ACS Technology Solutions. Again I am still sitting in the same office, doing the same job but now I work for ACS-TS instead of ACS. Oddly enough ACS and ACS-TS had entirely different benefits packages and I had to re-enroll in all my benefits for the 3^rd time in less than 9 months. Supposedly my last date at Kerr-McGee / Oryx Energy is the end of September. After that ACS-TS will move me to another client site (which one, I don't know yet).