Born at my grandparents flat in Quarry Hill Flats, Leeds, late September '58. At the age of 2 my family moved to Oastler House in Quarry Hill Flats. Our flat overlooked the Bus station and market, the view was always interesting and busy as well as very convenient for shopping. I attended St Charles infants then later St Patricks Junior School. As well as just being across the road to Quarry Hill they were in the same building which was just a little bit convenient. Having flunked the 11+ Exam the transfer to the Secondary Modern School of choice (Corpus Christi) was screwed up for some reason and so I attended Cross Green for 1 year. Joining Corpus in the 2nd year was not really a big deal and soon made new friends many of whom I still keep in touch with. In my last year at Corpus '75 I had decided that Electronics was the career for me & I was not going to wait until after A levels & Uni to get out earning. I joined the Royal Air Force in February '76 and after 6 weeks basic training at RAF Swinderby, Lincs I was posted to RAF Locking, Weston Super Mare for 13 months Electronics training. I graduated in May '77 with the rank of Junior Technician and the spent the next 4 years travelling the UK installing & removing RADAR & Comms gear usually from RAF Airfields although not always. In April '81 I was posted to RAFSU Belize in Central America. Belize is a very beautiful country the interior was almost unspoilt rain forest and the coast was protected by the 2nd longest barrier reef which afforded excellent snorkelling conditions in the no more than 20ft deep crystal clear sea. Almost every weekend there was a boat trip to the sandy cays on the barrier reef and sometimes we were able to cadge a lift on a helicopter to Ambergris Cay which was sheer paradise. It?s just a shame about the mossies (Mosquitoes) who never stopped biting for one minute all the time I was there. Part way through my Tour Of Duty, myself and good friend Mark 'Taff' Walters embarked on a wonderful tour. We paid for a lift on the Monthly LOX (Liquid Oxygen) run to USAF Homestead in Florida on a RAF Hercules with a crate of Belikin Beer (Local Belize brew). After a few days taking in the sights at Walt Disney World it was off to LA then a wonderful road trip that took in San Francisco, Lake Tahoe, Death Valley (Where our car broke down due to the heat!) and Vegas before returning to LA. It didn?t stop there though we next got a flight to Mexico City from where we got a bus to Acapulco (12hours red knuckle ride) - luckily I slept some of the way. After the 6 month tour of duty I was repatriated to blighty but things were never the same. Many friends were moving out to the Middle East on twice the forces salary and I soon followed. I splashed my cash & left the Air Force 2 years early for a job in the Sultanate of Oman. Employed on a 3 year contract as a civilian working for the Omani Airforce carrying out maintenance on Ground To Air communications and Airfield Navigational Aids at SOAF Thumrait. It was a very interesting time, Oman is a wonderful country and it was possible to borrow a pick-up and explore the very diverse environment. Around Thumrait the landscape was often referred to a Moon-scape as it very much resembled the landscape of the Moon, however take a 30 minute drive to the Jebel Samhan (Mountain range) towards Salalah and every year the ground is covered in a blanket of bright green grass and flowers for just a few months during the Khareef (monsoon). It was 17 weeks on then 3 weeks off & with a free ticket back to the UK or equivalent value in air tickets to wherever. I used the opportunity to travel the world visiting USA, Hawaii, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Dubai & many others. At the end of my contract I returned to Leeds with an idea to design & build a computer controlled mixer/synth device. I got a Prototype built but was unable to raise finance to take the project further so I had to abandon the idea & get a proper job. In late '87 I got a job repairing Mobira Mobile Phones who were soon to be acquired by a Company called Nokia who were 'famous' for producing toilet rolls and rubber goods. I became the Repair Centre Manager in 1980 and stayed for the next 20 years but unfortunately instead of getting a Gold Watch I only got a P45 - Thank You so much Link Telecom. I was responsible for creating and improving the Filemaker Database which we used later at 4 other locations, created bespoke web add-ons to the database to connect with BT Mobile and also Communicaid for seamless transfer of data from their help desks to our database. Created an intranet for all 5 service departments that enabled easy look up of all the latest service bulletins and firmware upgrades for the multitudes of mobiles that Nokia thought that they must produce every few months. The intranet helped us achieve audit scores of > 92% which enabled us to keep Premier Partner Status. I also installed and maintained an IP network of Servers and Workstations which started at Windows for Workgroups 3.1 all the way to Windows XP and Server 2003. Got interested in skiing in '87 and went at least once a year for more than the next 15 years, often just getting in the car at the start of the Christmas break and driving the 1000 or so miles to my favourite slopes at Zell Am See in Austria, also must give a mention to my favourite bar in the same town - Crazy Daisy (somewhere between Heaven & Rock n Roll is their boast). In the mid 90's I started to look a little further afield and for many years I enjoyed flying to LA, picking up a hire car & driving to Colorado. Took in skiing at Aspen, Breckenridge, Keystone & Vail with a wonderful road trip to take in Vegas, Arches National Park, Monument Valley, Moab, Grand Canyon to name just a few. Then in '99 I returned to Thailand and in November '00 I met the Lady who was to become my future wife in the Thai Island of Phuket. We got married in Bangkok in June '02 during the World Cup (strange that) and we finally persuaded the British consulate Bangkok that we should be allowed to live together in England & my wife joined me in August '02. Our first child, Maya Soraya Dean was born in August '04 at St James Hospital, Leeds. My father passed away in July '06 after a nightmare three and a half month stay in hospital and then quite unbelievably mother followed eight months later without much warning. Our second (and last) child Nina Serena Dean was born in September '07 at Leeds General Infirmary and then within weeks I was out of work, made redundant after 20 years - wonderful. Started work at SCD Group Ltd in April '08 as IT Systems Developer. SCD Group are a Construction & Fibre Networking Company and I take care of all the Servers and Workstations, create bespoke software using Microsoft SharePoint MOSS as the framework and SQL Server as the database. I am now starting to introduce the Apple iPAD to get data directly into the database to save on administration resources. Occasionally I get out of the office to install / commission Network Switches that hang off our fibre networks. And that's about it for the moment.......