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I can't see why anyone would be interested, but you have to have this sort of thing on any personal website. Its a tradition or an old charter or something.
I was born in 1962 in Billericay, Essex, and spent my first 16 years living in Laindon (except for school term time when I lived in a school near the village of Fyfield) and then moved near to Basildon town centre for a couple of years. When I was 18 I left home and moved to the bright lights of London, where I stayed until May 1995 when I moved to Crawley, West Sussex.
For a few years from 1978 I was involved in a theatre company which toured around when it could. That all fell apart when most of us left college and got proper jobs.
My 'proper' job was with ICL, where I stayed for 12 years, starting in a book-keeping job and ending up in an IT job. After ICL I moved to London Underground, where I looked after the computers on the District Line. When everything moved around during the preparation for privatisation I left LUL and ended up working for one of their sub-contractors where I managed a help desk for communication systems, got mesed around for a bit and eventually transferred to another part of the company, nearer to home, which is involved in aerospace where I am in the IT department.
In the meantime, I got elected to the local council in 2000 and spent 4 years doing that, eventually chairing the planning committee and serving as Deputy Mayor. It was a good four years, during which time I met a lot of people and made a lot of friends. I lost an election in 2004 and suddenly discovered what free time was for, although for a while I kept involved in several things which the Council introduced me to like the local Community Centre, Citizens Advice and the Crawley Campaign Against Racism.
In what spare time I get, I like to read (mostly fiction, but the odd science, politics or maths book for variety) and indulge my appetite for music (rock, African, French, rap and reggae mostly but a few other things as well). As an Essex boy I obviously support West Ham and watch them whenever they are on the TV. I hardly ever go to Upton Park any more, but have made a few visits to the Broadfield Stadium to see Crawley Town play. I have an acoustic and an electric guitar, a couple of harmonicas, an African talking drum and a Yamaha keyboard, but unfortunately no musical talent whatsoever. I really should have stuck to the stage!
I try and act normal, but have to confess to some nerdy tendancies... ever since getting a Sinclair Spectrum for my 21st birthday I have been a sucker for technology toys. The PC with broadband connection is obviously the number one toy, and I never leave home without the iRiver iHP-120 so I have 20Gb of MP3 and WMA music available wherever I go. But on the other hand, I can't really get excited about mobile phones and only carry a really old one.
Back in my ICL days I used to travel a lot with my job, visiting America, Australia, the Far East and Europe. Now I have to pay my own way, and have a family as well I don't get away so often. When we take holidays it tends to be in Greece with the kids, or long weekends in cities like Paris or New York if its just the two of us.
For transport I use a mixture of our Mondeo Estate, my Seat Arosa and the local buses. I have a mountain bike but don't use it much at the moment: a combination of age and living at the top of a nasty hill. I am thinking about getting a motorbike, but haven't got round to taking lessons yet. If I could have any car I would have a Morris Minor
Although I'm a scary looking bloke - fat, shaved head, tattoos - I'm really a bit of a softie. Too conditioned by society to actually let go and start crying like a girlie, I do frequently find myself filling up when overemotional at a variety of things like: when a football team wins a big event, seeing school plays, hearing Pink Floyd play Comfortably Numb live, Rememberance Day, the London Marathon. The list goes on... I am amazed I managed to avoid making a spectacle of myself as Deputy Mayor at all those events where you see people enjoying themselves so much or entertaining each other.