Kate Rauner is a retired Cold War Warrior. She worked for over twenty years at the Rocky Flats Plant, which was part of the nation's nuclear weapons complex. During the Cold War, Kate was a Chemical Engineer in a plutonium recycling and purification facility. She helped troubleshoot and improve the processes and did some research and development work as well. After the Cold War fizzled out, she switched to environmental engineering and project planning during the lengthy clean-up of the plant, which is now a wildlife refuge. "I've held plutonium in my hands," she says. "Not many people have done that." Kate next moved to southwest New Mexico and worked at the copper mines around Silver City, including the historic Santa Rita mine. Santa Rita has been mined since Native Americans collected copper there before the Spaniards entered Mexico. Today she lives outside Silver City at the edge of the Gila National Forest with her husband, dog, three cats, and four llamas. She enjoys hiking and bird-watching, and, as a volunteer firefighter, has fought wildland and home fires. "I'm well on my way to my life's goal" Kate says. "To become an eccentric old woman." Check out Kate's blog on http://katerauner.wordpress.com