Interests

Current activity

I have bundles of good ideas and often will think of something and see it implemented by someone else several years later! Ideally, there would be someone around who runs with some of my ideas and tries to do something with them but for now, though, it's just me and I'm pretty content with life.

At present, I have a few clients for design work and have abandoned teaching. I am far too politically incorrect to be employed these days! Most of my time for the past few years has been spent with the Corgi Toys business, developing the catalogue and searching for scarce items and answering people's queries.

If you could use someone with excellent design and writing skills, who also loves working with numbers then just get in touch any time!

This page is all about my hobbies and interests, rather than work. Not that there is always that much difference now!

Interests



There is always something I want to do . . .

I am never, ever, bored. There are so many things I like doing that I think I shall have to live until well past 100 to catch up with them all. Whilst I enjoy most of the work stuff, if I can ever afford to retire there'll be plenty to keep me occupied. Even when obliged to attend some tedious presentation or meeting, or stuck in a hire car in a traffic jam, which spring to mind as recent instances where boredom ought to have set in with a vengeance, all I need is some paper and a pen. A capacity to daydream amusingly is also useful.

Left to my own devices, life in Astcote, a small village in green Northamptonshire, England is great and although not a lot seems to be going on you'll see from my In The Village blog that really hasn't been so. If there wasn't the Paddock Party Committee there'll have been birds and flowers and sheep to write about.

Or I can always take photographs. Digital cameras are brilliant. I always wanted to edit photos and now I can without requiring the services of a chemist or schoolfriend with a darkroom and equipment.

If BBC Radio 2 isn't on I have enough tracks to last a week or two to play. I still love the music I'd hear on vinyl or a transistor radio in the 1960s as well as more latest releases than I would have expected to enjoy but definitely do. Addicted to programmes like X Factor, American Idol and others, I post running commentaries on Twitter and articles on an Entertainment blog.

Several TV series have been unmissable and films essential viewing over the years and I have even started watching recordings or DVD versions of some again and been surprised that I still really enjoy them, even knowing how they end. Odd that but I'm not complaining. I have even had a part in one film and a play myself.

I adore cars and spend so much time in my own that they become almost part of me. I have had an interesting range of new and old and have been sad to see all them go but delighted to see the latest on the drive. I will drive virtually anywhere rather than take a bus or train, although that is getting less affordable these days so most trips are pretty much necessary ones, unlike the 1980s when I drove with friends to the Greek Islands a couple of times.

There's something about the Greek Islands that made a strong impression on me and if I'm not here one day that's where you should look first. Or maybe try Gozo, my latest favourite place!

Despite computers taking over almost all my waking hours in some form or another, a stamp collection started at age 11 is still going strong and I have a marvellous collection of GB Machin definitive issues in which I have become something of an expert.

I could go on . . . in fact, I hope I shall!