Title page last updated 2025-03-11--other pages may change all the time
I'm a hearing person. I love music, I enjoy amateur radio, I'm fascinated by languages. Writing is one of my favourite pastimes, and few things give me more enjoyment than reading a bit of good prose.
I'm not a visual person. I don't own a TV, almost never go to the movies, and am almost invariably disappointed when I do.
Get to the point, I hear you say. OK, OK: The creation of these pages is being squeezed into an ultra-busy schedule, and I'm using a simple DOS editor to do it. It will probably load like lightning, but it does not contain any fancy graphics or design. There are millions of sites on the Internet that contain fancy graphics, and if that's what you want, you probably want to find one of those and enjoy.
This site contains some interesting information, a few snippets about myself and my pastimes, and maybe even a few unsolicited opinions.
There are great plans for this site, but because of the commitments that you'll read about in these pages, I'm not very hopeful that they will quickly come to fruition. Please bear with me; I'll keep adding stuff intermittently, and maybe it will look better on your next visit.
I trust you'll enjoy spending a few minutes with me. If you don't, the best I can do is to recommend a good search engine. You're bound to find sites with great graphics out there!
I live in South Africa's Gauteng province, near the city of Pretoria. I have a tiny house on a hilltop southeast of the city, where I spend a few hours each night. I even get some sleep occasionally. I turned 60 in 2024. My "friends" say that I've been going downhill. I have to agree; there's no doubt that the pace has been picking up!
Afrikaans is my mother tongue, but I speak fluent broken English and some not-so-fluent broken German. I also speak enough Italian to help myself with accommodation, transport and food (probably the most important thing in Italy!), and can navigate my way around most of the other western European languages with some arm-waving. I've spent four years working on my Greek, but unfortunately it is still Greek to me.
I'm an electronic engineer by training, and studying part time. 2025 is my 40th year as a university student. Include 12 years of school, and we're now well over the half-century mark in formal education. Nevertheless, I still envy everyone else. They seem to have all the answers.
I enjoy music, mainly classical, and reading and writing. I fly part-time, with professional-level qualifications in aeroplanes, helicopters, gliders and hot air balloons. For more than a decade, I ran a flying school. I eventually sold the school. The discretionary time that I suddenly had has somehow miraculously disappeared again. I'm involved in a local Christian church.
I try to look after myself, and despite my hectic schedule I try to make time for enough exercise and relaxation. I eat mainly vegetarian, although I have to admit to a certain predilection for cheese. Yeah, I know it's not the greatest, but it certainly goes down well!
You can find more about some of the things I keep myself busy with, by clicking on the relevant link:
I've included a few short musings on various subjects that I've thought and read about over the years. Perhaps you'll find them as useful as I have.
About People, a short piece on how people view things differently. It may help you to understand your own quirks a little better, or perhaps to understand others' preferences too.
Places to visit in Gauteng, a historical background on South Africa and a list of places you may want to see if you visit South Africa's Gauteng Province. The history includes some amazing parallels with history in other parts of the world.
The Dating Game, a piece on date formats that are easy to file and easy to understand, without the ambiguity that most formats suffer from. It's hosted on my ham radio site.
About Musical Tastes, a fanciful look at why people like the music they do. Is it perhaps a case of being indoctrinated at the right age?
Getting to know me, a quiz that reveals everything about my innermost being.
There's a small collection of narratives on this Site, some home-brew and some stolen from other sources. The Eclipse and Tornado stories are especially memorable.
You can also find the beginnings of a collection of fun quizzes on this Site.
If you don't find the info you're looking for, or you want to tell me something, you can contact me by email. Use my first name's initial, at the name of this domain.