In a further act of blatant plagiarism of Derek Sivers, this is a simple about me page where I can waffle on about myself.
Some facts
Born and raised in London, England
I live in London with my wife and daughter
My day job is in healthcare. It has its challenges but I love what I do. At its best it's the best job I can imagine myself having. You can decide if that is a failure of imagination or not.
I have a lot of hobbies and interests that can be hard to keep up with. I can get excited about most things honestly.
I think something that really shaped me was being a young teenager right as the internet went mainstream and came into everyone's homes. Figuring out how to make and do stuff and communicate with like minded people. It was inventive and fun, a lot of stuff was DIY and it was all a lot freer and more exciting in a pre-Big Tech and social media online world.
I was also really shaped by the music I loved at that time and throughout my teens and still now tbh - a lot of it aggressively independent and DIY and anti-corporate and essentially often a cottage industry. I still find those things inspiring and important.
I'm not a technophobe - I love technology. But I do hate a lot of the ways we are unquestioningly welcoming nefarious corporations into every facet of our lives and allowing a small handful of billionaires to extract limitless capital from our simple existence. I also think that a lot of the time, just because there is a tech solution to something, doesn't mean its better than the old school or analogue alternative. TLDR I really hate smartphones. Yup, one of them :)
I love people and am also a big introvert, which is a frustrating combination to be. I always want more friends and more alone time.
I'm very sentimental and love trinkets and small details and preserving things. I try to be an amateur historian of my own very normal life (all life is remarkable, but once you get beyond that fact, my existence is really nothing special and I find that quite comforting - yes I do love Oliver Burkeman).
I'm trying to see the good in the world and in people and remain optimistic despite how much of a Sisyphean struggle it can be. As well as being better for my mental health personally, I also see this as an act of resistance. I often rewatch this video to remind myself of this, as well as talking to my brilliant wife who is much better at this than me.
I'm also trying to internalise the mantra that I should aim to create more than I consume, with varying degrees of success. To me this is a clarion call to avoid too much passive consumption, and I take a very broad view of "creation" - it could be writing, journalling, drawing, painting, playing guitar at an extremely basic level, making this website, other fun computer projects, decorating, curating my media library, assembling things, fixing things around the house, nurturing relationships (creating bonds!), cooking, baking, finger painting with my daughter - the list goes on. I have a demanding full time job and a toddler, I am literally always tired, but making space for any and all of these things is absolutely essential to me feeling like a human being who is alive.
I love reading and always have one or more books on the go. I try to read widely and this year I set myself the challenge to not buy any books and only read stuff I already have or am gifted or find in free libraries. Connect with me on Pagebound. (This bullet point is here partly because I have been slacking on reading lately ever since I bought and softmodded a Nintendo DSi so now I can play Pokémon on the Tube to work instead of reading and I need to remember that books are good for my brain and as much as I love my Togepi it is not really able to give me the same level of intellectual nourishment).
I am fiercely independent, I love figuring things out for myself. I'm very resourceful and resilient (or stubborn) and don't give up easily on things I care about. The other side of this coin is I am very bad at asking for help and probably too tolerant of bad situations at times. Every strength is a weakness and vice versa.
Really what I hope to get from this whole thing is just to put a bit of myself onto the internet away from the usual avenues. To make a little space for a weird, nerdy person to exist without seeing or being an advert, away from algorithmic social media and the relentless machine of consumption. Probably no-one will ever see or read it, but when you think about it, maybe that's even more punk anyway lol.
If any of that appeals to you we are probably the same type of weirdo and you can say hello here.