Will Watson and his wife Janet moved to Highland last August from Glendale Ariz. "We thought it would be a good to trade five months of over 100 degrees for five months of winter," he said.

After retiring from the Air Force as a Lieutenant Colonel in military intelligence Watson taught ROTC in college. Watson has many stories about his adventures during the Cold War. However when he was in the intelligence service he took an oath not to divulge the activities he was engaged in for 30 years. When he could he shared his some of the stories in talks to his students and in speaking engagements. His children urged him to write them down.

As he wrote them it occurred to him they would make good books. He tried his hand at romantic fiction using his life as a basis. "I am a romantic at heart so I wanted to add that to my adventures," he said.

His foray into the world of publishing has been an adventure on it own. He found if he didn't make it graphic and sexy it wouldn't sell to national publishers. On the other hand if he used the colorful language he couldn't sell it on the local market. He opted to go through a company, Book Surge Publishing, on the Internet and published his first book with their help.

He went to Vietman twice and flew on Air Force One as an intelligence officer with both Presidents Carter and Reagan on many diplomatic missions.

He spent two years in the service on alert for the National Emergency Command Air Post. This entailed keeping a plane which was fully equipped as a presidential command post ready to take the president of the Untitled States into the air to take command in case of a national emergency or attack.

"This plane was maintained for over 50 years during the cold war," he said. "We did numerous dry runs like war games. There were two computers in Colorado Springs. One was for the simulated attacks and one code named Real World was put into use in the event of an actual attack. We would have eight minutes to get the president up if a missile was launched from a Soviet submarine. We would have 20 minutes if it was launched from land.

"Once we got an alert from the Real World computer and scrambled to get off the ground but the president never showed up," he said. We had full authorization to launch an attack missile at the Soviets which would have meant World War III but it was called off at the last minute. It was a human error but really frightening. That was how close we came to a another world war. There was a big article about it in the Washington Post at the time."

Watson has had several close calls. He was skiing in Alaska when he was charged by a moose. He climbed a tree where he stayed for several hours until he was rescued.

He was too young to remember his first brush with death.

"When I wasn't even two years old my mother and two other siblings were left to die in the desert.," he said. "My father was a prospector and we lived in a tent. The temperature was 120 degrees. He went into the closest town to buy supplies and left my mother and three kids and somehow couldn't get back for over a week. In the meantime we ran out of food and water so my mother who was pregnant tried to walk with the other two kids and carrying me to get help but collapsed. She was rescued by the man I grew up thinking was my father. I never knew I was adopted until I was older. I then found out my mother had divorced my real father. He had re-married and I had brothers and sisters I had never known existed."

He went into the Air Force right out of high school and was stationed in Germany. He met Janet, an American who lived with her parents who worked as a civilian for the army in France.

Janet said her husband has always been fun and optimistic. "He's a wonderful father who loves to go skiing, hiking and camping with the kids," she said. "He has thoroughly enjoyed writing and wants to get the stories down before he gets too old."

His book "The Opernball" can be located on Amazon.com through Book Surge Publishing. "I have gotten some good reviews from those who have read it so far," Watson said.