This site is written and published by Chris Turner.
I’m a fifty-something geek in Texas, a Christ-follower, husband, dad to three boys, podcaster, writer, and Mac geek. I love college football, hockey, and baseball.
I worked in the tech sector for a couple of decades. After a 16-year run as a full-time stay-at-home dad, I have re-entered the work force. I grew up in Baton Rouge from the age of five, and still consider it my hometown. I attended LSU, where I met my wife.
Projects and Endeavors
Two of our three boys came to us through adoption. As a result, I’m keen to assist foster and adoptive parents in our roles of helping kids from hard places; and all foster and adopted kids are kids from hard places. I’m also a total nerd: I was a band geek in middle and high school; I’ve read science fiction and fantasy since elementary school; I’ve collected comic books since I was six; I started playing Dungeons & Dragons when I was in the sixth grade (WAY before it was cool); and I’ve been into computing of one form or another since I was 11.
To those ends, I currently host two podcasts:
- The Empowered Parent Podcast: The Empowered Parent Podcast with Kayla and Ryan North is a trust-based, trauma-informed, connected parenting resource, hosted by yours truly.
- The Big Fat Geek Podcast: I co-host this podcast with my friends Nathan and Dallas. We wanted to offer a podcast for folks like us: casual nerds interested in movies, comics, science fiction, fantasy, gaming, and other aspects of geek culture, but who are balancing marriages and kids with their passion for geeky things.
I have had the privilege of hosting Tapestry Conference, 2018 – 2021.
One of the ways we maintain ties to Rwanda, the homeland of our youngest, is through Imana Kids, a non-profit devoted to helping orphans and street kids in Kigali. We aim to meet the basic needs of all the kids we sponsor—food, water, shelter, and love. We strive to provide the best possible education for each of them. In 2018, we began the Hope Village project, where we seek to provide a trauma-informed educational and healing environment for these young men and women who have been left behind by Rwandan society.
I began working as a copy editor for About This Particular Macintosh in June 1998, and rose through the ranks to become Managing Editor from February 2003 until we ceased publishing in May 2012. I made lifelong friends through that volunteer publication.
Tools
Nerds love tools, and we always want to know what everyone else is using, too. My daily driver is an iPhone 14 Pro, because when my phone is the camera I always have with me, I want the best available. When I’m in the home office, a 27-inch, 2017 Retina 5K iMac is front and center. When I need a portable Mac, I go with my 2015 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro, which rides in a Filson Journeyman Backpack or a black GoRuck GR1. A 4th-generation iPad Air with a black Magic Keyboard helps fill the gaps between the iPhone and the MacBook.
While I’ve tried lots of writing tools, I keep coming back to BBEdit, which I first began using around 1995 with BBEdit Lite 2.5. I supplement that with Bear, Drafts, and iA Writer for cross-device compatibility.
This site runs on WordPress. It currently uses a modified-by-Twentig version of the Twenty Twenty theme, because I’m trying to keep things relatively simple.
What’s a Retrophisch?
retrophisch (re-tro-fish), n.
Living organism which is placed in the auditory canal of intelligent life forms. Used as a universal translator.
Disadvantage: Translates to pure Anglo-Saxon English, hence the prefix “retro.”
No, seriously, what’s a Retrophisch?
“Retrophisch” is an anagram from my full first name, bestowed upon me by a dear friend and former co-worker, Francisco. A fellow co-worker agreed with my assessment that “retrophisch” sounded like an off-shoot of the babelfish from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. From that conversation came the above definition.
Since that time in the fall of 2002, this has been my online moniker.
In addition to the online persona he graced me with over twenty years ago, Francisco has also produced both of the logos I’ve used on the sites which have born this moniker. He took my rough sketches and turned them into designs which far exceeded my original ideas. The use of the shark, the OG “retro fish”, in this latest version was inspired, and I cannot thank him enough for all he’s done for me in this regard.
Contact
Your best bet is to reach out to me on Twitter or Mastodon. You can send an email to the shortened version of my first name (see above) at this domain.