Stuff about me ehh?? Probably the hardest page to produce for this site... Oh well... Here goes.. Apart from a year or two in the Middle East when I was very young I spent all of my childhood in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, UK.
My parent (that's these guys to the left) worked hard to provide us kids with all we needed... and they're still helping us now! I've two sisters.... Anna lives in Wiltshire and teaches at primary school level while Laura lives in London and works as a Stage Manager.
I left school in 1990 and began a carpentry apprenticeship working for a company called Inn Development and Signage (I.D.S. Ltd). To my knowledge IDS are not in existence now but they taught me so much in the short time I was with them. Between IDS and my college classes, required by my apprenticeship, I learned a great deal about carpentry and basic construction. Unfortunately I completed just a single year of my apprenticeship before I was made redundant from IDS. Without a job I couldn't continue my apprenticeship and because of the economic recession of the early 90's the only realistic alternative for me was to return to education.
As a child I'd always had an interest in aviation and even while training as a carpenter I always knew that one day I'd fly. With the prospect of University my thoughts turned to a professional flying career. University was really a last minute decision as I hadn't given it too much thought up until that point, but the chance was there so off I went to Portsmouth and after a few years I graduated with a degree in Applied Physics. I'd suffered from a bowel condition called Ulcerative Colitis (UC) while I was at University but it was controlled. A month after I graduated it came back with a vengence and I had to have surgery to remove my large bowel/colon, which meant a stay of two months in hospital. This of course ended any hope I might have had of flying in the forces. Over the following three years I had five operations to correct my situation with a J-pouch fashioned from my remaining bowel.... So as not to gross anyone out I won't go in to detail any further but if you have UC, Crohn's or you're just interested the web links at the bottom of this page can explain things further.
Now, apart from a belly full of scars I'm back to full health and feeling better than ever before, but after three years out of the loop so to speak science and technology moves on so I returned to University at Lancaster in Lancashire to study for a Masters Degree in Satellite Communications & Space Environment. This was just a year long course and in December 2003 I gained my Masters and started looking for work. The opportunity arose to go back to Lancaster Uni to do Ph.D research within the Department of Communication Systems. My partner, Janine, recently finished her degree in Enviromental Biology at Lancaster Uni. She's worse than me about having a picture taken and refuses to let me put any pictures of her on this site, but she'll come around. :-)
For anyone curious about my illness and subsequent J-pouch surgery or if you suffer from an Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) the following links may be useful.
St. Mark’s Hospital and Academic Institute : ia - The Ileostomy and Internal Pouch Support Group : The J-Pouch Group
