I haven't always been an academic. My working life has included being in the Merchant Navy (as a radio officer), owning a chain of hairdressing salons with my first wife, being a sales rep and later a sales manager, being a marketing consultant, working on company turnrounds, and being a company director. As a company director I sat on the boards of companies ranging from a picture-framing and general woodwork factory in Wiltshire through to a computer software house in Gloucestershire: other companies included a builders' merchants, a finance company, a magazine publisher, and a coach hire company.
In my spare time I have an interest in the performing arts: I have worked as a musician, and been a musical director in the theatre, as well as (of course) being in the audience a lot. I have a pilot's licence and fly light aircraft, and have an interest in a flying school (although I don't have an instructors' rating yet). My wife and I like to travel, and spend around three months of the year out of the country: consequently I get a lot of chance to practice speaking foreign languages, mostly very badly. I can be a tourist in something like ten languages, but only to the level of ordering a meal and booking a hotel! Mandarin was the absolute worst one - I still can't do more than tell people my name and say hello and goodbye, but luckily only about half of all Chinese people speak it anyway, so my wife (who trained as an actress) gets the chance to use her pantomime skills.
I think the most important thing in my life is to keep learning new things. I love history books, and I am currently learning to be a gardener by having an allotment, which usually means that I grow seedlings up to the point where I can plant them in the allotment, where they usually die within a few days. We are currently waging a war on the local rabbits.
The other thing I love is cooking for friends. We entertain most weekends, unless we have been invited back, and sometimes we have two or three dinner parties in a week. I was on the Cardiff episode of Come Dine With Me, and I often handle the catering for Samba Galez, the samba band I play in, if we are away for a weekend. Cooking for forty drummers is a challenge, but they are usually pretty appreciative, and of course plenty of people volunteer to help.
Overall, I'd say that I like a lot of variety in my life, and that being the case I have certainly got the life I wanted!
