Hi,

This is where you get to find out a bit more about me.

I live in the Gwent Valleys in South Wales and I moved there in 2003 after living and working in Cardiff, London and overseas for the rest of the time. I grew up in Cardiff and it will always feel like my home even though I have now "escaped" to semi rural living.

I was born in 1965, which puts me into my early 40's, I had not looked forward to hitting 40 but once it happened, it was sheer liberation. The notion that life begins at 40 is true in my opinion because it gives you lots of excuses to start to act cranky and blame your age for it. I can finally say "i really don't give a shit" and mean it.

Life at home for me is shifting, I'm exploring my interests more and making time for friends and family. I am spending more time seeing movies, visiting friends, watching rugby, drinking wine, flying my kites, fishing, drinking wine, going on picnics, playing golf oh and drinking more wine! Don't worry, the quality of the wine interests me more than the quantity. I find myself in the happy situation where the majority of the work is now completed on my house, leaving me with little hands on maintenance and no major projects so I am in the process of taking on an allotment of agricultural land that I can transform into my own personal version of "the good life". Organic vegetables and possibly chickens have been thought about but first will come the clearing operation as the land has been badly overgrown for many years so it needs a bit of elbow grease to get it up to scratch. I am sure a potting shed and old radio will follow but I will leave the flat cap to the old codgers. At this rate I will start looking in skips when I pass them.

Life at work has been steady for the last 4/5 years and indeed the last 9 years with my employer. I am a qualified Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (I also have Post Grad Quals in Management) plus a host of other tech qualifications, which sit nicely with my IT career. I work at a Power Station just outside Bristol and I look after their IT Infrastructure as part of a small team of 2 people. We basically design, build and support everything IT related. I am on call for the site on a 1 in 2 basis. Going to work for me is a pleasure, I do get the odd day where I swear a lot and bang my coffee down too hard on the desk but those days are rare. I'm more likely to be stuck with my nose almost touching the screen totally into what I'm doing and loving it.

Lovelife reads like a bit of a ships log. Long periods of calm sunny weather with lazy days sunning myself but the odd storm to rock the boat and tear down the mast! I have finally put my anchor over the side and it is for life. My partners name is Deb. She is quite simply, wonderful x.

Future plans for me have changed recently, I plan on staying around this area for a while, my yearning for warmer weather though is becoming more strong as time passes. I think a trip to Aussie may seal it and change my future plans for good.

Nicola

Sept 2008