I grew up in Cowra, a small country town in Australia (it's about 4 hours drive west of Sydney). At school, my strongest subjects were the maths/sciences. Although I enjoy reading and writing, being forced to write essays about books that often didn't interest me meant that my results in humanities perhaps did not properly reflect my abilities. During this time I became a bit of a music fanatic.

After completing high school, I headed to Charles Sturt University where I studied for a Bachelor of Applied Science (Industrial Mathematics & Computing). This was in the town of Bathurst (population 30,000), approximately 100km from Cowra. The degree was perhaps not what I dreamed of doing but it at least kept me busy for three years. While at University I became interested in the student newspaper and occasionally wrote articles/reviews/whatever and helped out where I could. One piece about campus practical jokes became particularly notorious and I was dubbed "the prankster" by some. In my final year, I was also involved in the campus Young Achievers program, where amongst other duties I was responsible for compiling/editing the annual report for the company. Amongst all this, I somehow became one of the central figures in the increasingly bizarre LARS=SEX GOD movement.

After three years of frighteningly abstract mathematics, I finally graduated, wearing one of those strange hats (what's the significance of them?) as I was handed my degree by some complete stranger who congratulated me on my efforts. Higher education is a strange system.

It seemed even stranger when I started my first job at Macquarie Bank, Sydney. I was able to apply none of my calculus studies and instead, was introduced to the world of relational databases in my new position as a Database Administrator. In this role, I specialised in infrastructure development and maintenance, with my most significant project being the design and development of an extensive set of intranet pages for our team and the developers we supported.

After two years of wrestling with Sybase and SQL in an environment which was often called "chaotic", I decided I'd like to try my hand at being a UNIX system administrator within the same organisation. In the end, I stayed in this position for only a year.

Having seen many friends and colleagues heading to London to live, work and of course travel, it was inevitable that I would get the bug myself. Although I enjoyed my time at Macbank immensely, I handed in my resignation and bought myself a plane ticket.

Upon arrival in London, I spent 3 months working at Lehman Bros as a UNIX sysadmin in their Y2000 testing lab. Since finishing that contract, I did some travelling around the UK before returning to Lehmans to work as a UNIX sysadmin and then as a Sybase Database Administrator. I completed my contract there in mid-January 2000, did a little more travelling and then returned to Australia. I am now living and working in Melbourne.

I have had a presence on the internet since 1994, when I was introduced to email and the World Wide Web. In 1995 I established my first set of web pages, including a small section devoted to Australian singer/songwriter Stephen Cummings. That small section is now 230+ pages large and actively supported by Stephen. I finally met my primary collaborator, graphic artist Ross Robinson, in London in '98 and we've since become good friends. In 1998, I also created a fan site for Irish rock band Hothouse Flowers, which has grown to become one of the most significant HF sites on the net. The other sites which I maintain are listed on the main page of this site.

I admire the net as a medium for open and free communication. I admire it's ability to allow people to build communities based solely on some common interest (eg. a particular musician). My pages for ex-students of Cowra High School also take advantage of that. I also find the net useful as a way of giving my various creative writing some sort of audience. If you're interested, I recommend reading my short story Family or some of my more recent attempts at song lyrics.