Introduce yourself

[Deleted]

Jan 25, 2013 0:15:04 GMT Khunanup said:

I pass the rest of my time by following Tranmere Rovers in football

There are three Tranmere fans among the prisoners I work with - all in a state of disbelieving joy at the moment.

[Philip Davies]

I was born in Withington Hospital in 1976, then lived in Heaton Mersey until 1979 when my family moved to Marple, where my parents still live. I went to Sheffield Hallam University from 1994 to 1998 with a year work placement in 1996/97 near Wallingford. I then got a job with the largest employer in the Macclesfield area and moved to the town in 2003. I got married last year and we are in the process of moving house. No children yet, but we do have a Boston Terrier called Betty.

Outside of following politics and elections I enjoy watching sport, particularly Manchester United, listening to music and reading true crime books.

[erlend]

Jan 25, 2013 10:23:45 GMT CatholicLeft said:

Jan 25, 2013 0:15:04 GMT Khunanup said:

I pass the rest of my time by following Tranmere Rovers in football

There are three Tranmere fans among the prisoners I work with - all in a state of disbelieving joy at the moment.

That seems a disproportionately high rate of locking up Tranmere supporters!

[Deleted]

Jan 26, 2013 17:28:05 GMT @boogieeck said:

Jan 26, 2013 13:08:04 GMT erlend said:

[That seems a disproportionately high rate of locking up Tranmere supporters!

It's a club from Liverpool

Don't say that to them - they are from the other side of the Mersey: The Wirral. Other than that, your point stands.

[erlend]

Its a scouse club with a rather lower number of supporters. But I suppose they are all local rather than plane loads of foreigners!

[Khunanup]

To help Boogs and Erlend I will inform you of the words to a song we sing (to the somewhat appropriate tune of the Wild Rover):

'Do not be mistaken, do not be mislead.
We're not Scousers, we're from Birkenhead.
You can stuff your cathedrals, and your Pier Head.
We're not Scousers, we're from Birkenhead.'

Added to that, when the common chant of 'Stand up if you hate Scousers' is started by opposition fans they get very confused when we as one join them in, er, standing up!

[Khunanup]

Jan 25, 2013 10:23:45 GMT CatholicLeft said:

Jan 25, 2013 0:15:04 GMT Khunanup said:

I pass the rest of my time by following Tranmere Rovers in football

There are three Tranmere fans among the prisoners I work with - all in a state of disbelieving joy at the moment.

We all are! I went to Brentford last Saturday fully expecting to see our final game at the top of the division, and we won again. It's like a dream we keep hoping against hope we don't wake up from.

[shakira001]

Hello Im Simon Nissim your new member here.
And im happy to join your site.
Thanks for warm welcome.



Truly Yours:
Simon Nissim

[john07]

Well as Boogie has shamed me into posting an introduction, here it is:

My name is John Lowe. I was born in darkest Shropshire but move at a very early age to Handforth, Hazel Grove and then Cheadle Hulme. Initially we lived in the 'rough' side in Adswood before moving to the leafier suburbs.

I failed the 11+ but managed to pass five O-Levels and eventually qualified as a Chartered Surveyor. I then took A-Levels independently and did enough to get a place at the University of Manchester.

I did not become politically active until I started at Manchester University in 1971. Manchester was a vibrant place with a number of prominent Liberals such as William Wallace and Michael Steed on the staff. Fe=rom the Labour Party there was Lewis Minkin who had written many book on the Party and specifically on the Party Conference.

My first vote in a General Election had gone to the Liberal Mike Winstanley in 1970. This was a tactical vote!

I got involved with the Manchester Exchange By-election in 1973 working for the Labour Candidate Frank Hatton. He defeated my tutor Michael Steed. The following February there was a General Election and Manchester Exchange was no more. The Hulme Ward where we had work in 1973 was now absorbed into the Tory held Moss Side Constituency.

This was an interesting election. There were five Wards in Moss Side, two of which were strong Labour: Moss Side and Hulme. Two were solid Tory: Chorlton and Alexander. The final ward was Lloyd Street which included the housing around Maine Road and was marginal Labour. This added up to a knife edge Constituency with a much higher turnout expected in Chorlton and Alex than Hulme or Moss Side. Frank Hatton was elected and held on in the second election in 1974. I was organizing the University students in Hulme bby the second election are Nivk Brown departed for Tyneside.

I joined the Labour Party between the two General Elections in 1974 and switched my vote from Liberal to Labour in the process.

I soon found myself Secretary on Stockport District Labour Party and was a district council candidate for Heaton Moor/Heaton Chapel in 1976 and also in Hazel Grove ward in a by-election later that year. I stood for Bredbury and Romiley in the County Council Elections in 1997 and had already been adopted as PPC for Hazel Grove.

By 1977, my postgraduate course was completed and I found gainful employment at the University of Aston in Birmingham. I stayed in Moseley for a term before moving to Coventry in January 1978. I was elected as councillor for Cheylesmore Ward on Coventry City Council. I won a three year term with the second highest vote in a whole council election. Despite being expelled from the Labour Group twice, I rose to the dizzying heights as Deputy Chair off Transportation and Highways and 'sometimes' chair of the Planning Committee.

With my term running out and my job at Aston melting away, I moved on to Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh in 1983. although in the meantime the family had moved to Leicester. I commuted weekly to Edinburgh until 1987 when the family moved up to leafy Merchiston.

I had grown rather disillusioned with the direction of the Labour Party although I remained a supporter of Neil Kinnock. I never got involved with Leicester East CLP although I was active in Rushey Mead Ward. After moving to Edinburgh two meetings of Merchiston-Morningside Branch put me off and I let my membership lapse around 1990.

Although I had a BSc in Politics and an MSc in Public Policy and Administration from Manchester, my interests moved to economics and was awarded a PhD in 1993.

I moved from Heriot-Watt to Glasgow Caledonian University in 1996 and ve helped it grow from a 'technical college' (when Gordon Brown lectured there) to a respected institution, at least in my subject area!

I rejoined the Fabian Society around five years ago and have been semi-active over the past two years. I have not got around to rejoining Labour and I am not sure if I ever will.

[Philip Davies]

Jan 27, 2013 14:01:36 GMT @boogieeck said:

we have had re-introductions from

Kris, Boogie, Fraser, Pete, Robin, Dok, Swan, Benjamin, AC, Colin J, Cogload, Novice (a welcome newbie) , CK, Hempie, Arthur, Cibwr, catholicleft, Khunanup, (18)

From the top 20 posters, Ianrobo, Bish, Andyajs, EAL, David Boothroyd, Richard Allen, ianBhx, tonyotim, erlend, john 07, trident, john loony, shibboleth and Great kingrat, have not introduced themselves.

and me, but as Kevin Spacey's character Lester Burnham said in American Beauty:

It's okay. I wouldn't remember me either.

[anthony]

Born in Preston on 29 Feb 1980 (at which point my mum won a bet), we moved to Northamptonshire in 1993. I first got interested in politics through my A-level history module on early 19th century British history (Lord Liverpool et al). Initially worried about the democratic deficit in the EU, I joined the Liberal Democrats in 1999 whilst at University - although casting my first vote in the 1999 Euro elections for the Green Party.
I later found out more about the way legislation was created in the EU, and this tempered my euro-scepticism (although, I do believe in subsidarity, both up and down!).

After university worked in legal publishing, producing obscure books and assisting the Falkland Islands Law Revision commissioner from an Oxford-based legal publishers. In 2002 I moved to London to take a slightly less obscure legal publishing role and be nearer my girlfriend. In 2005, I joined the research team at a barristers' chambers, and now run the team.

First got actively involved in politics by meeting my PPC handing out leaflets outside Wimbledon station one cold November morning in 2004.

Since then I have been chair of my local branch, a local election candidate twice, an agent for multiple types of elections and council by-election. I am a Lib Dem Returning Officer and recently joined the London Regional Exec committee through a co-option.

Oh, I also used to be a trade union activist for the NUJ, of which I am still a member. I married my wife in 2011 in Wimbledon, where she was born.

[greatkingrat]

So you must be our youngest member, having celebrated your 8th birthday last year.

[anthony]

Jan 30, 2013 12:36:55 GMT greatkingrat said:

So you must be our youngest member, having celebrated your 8th birthday last year.

Indeed; I probably won't reach my 25th birthday . . .

[erlend]

Something which if were told that by most people before their 9th birthday might be rather distressing.

[Tony Otim]

Hi. i'm 37 years old, was born in deepest darkest Surrey and stayed there until I was 18. After a brief stint teaching in East Africa I came to Uni in Edinburgh and have stayed here ever since. I have a degree in English literature and a postgrad in Comm Ed and work for the council's cHildren & Families' Dept.

Joined the Green party in 2010, after successfully campaigning to get a Green councillor elected again in meadows Morningside last year I moved up the road to a ward with two conservatives and 1 Nat representing it.

Married for a year and a half, a father for almost a week. Old hobbies included watching lots of films and playing football. new ones include changing nappies and not sleeping much

[East Anglian Lefty]

I was born in Rugby but grew up just outside Colchester, where I went to the local grammar school. Not being good enough to do classics to degree level and not wanting to ever have to take another course on Hitler and Stalin, I leapt at the chance to do a degree on the languages and history of Dark Age Britain and related parts in Cambridge. I'm now doing a PhD at the University of Aberdeen in a related field, but permanently resident in Cambridge and temporarily resident in Oslo on a visiting studentship.

2005 was the first election I could vote in, and I backed the Labour candidate. This was a protest vote, as whilst I preferred Lib Dem policies at the time, their PPC struck me as a complete waste of space. I honestly can't remember whether I voted Lib Dem or Labour in 2006. If pushed, I'd guess it was the latter, but the ward wasn't marginal enough for it to make a blind bit of difference.

I joined the Labour Party in 2007 because I wanted a vote if there was going to be a leadership contest. I delivered a couple of leaflet rounds in Cambridge, but didn't start to get involved until I moved to Tottenham when I was taking my M. A. In 2009, back in Cambridge and unemployed, I really began to get active. I was a local election candidate in 2010, was elected chair of my local branch when we managed to reconstitute it after the election and helped run a by-election campaign. In Aberdeen I found myself CLP secretary when the previous incumbent left the city without telling anybody, and about six months later also found myself chairing the Labour Club (a post I spent the next six months trying to hand off to somebody else). I'm hoping to be a paper candidate this year and will be looking for a winnable ward as soon as it's likely I'll be living in the same city for four years.

I'm in a long-term long-distance relationship with a woman much smarter than me, who's also tolerant enough to have joined the Labour Party (though she still thinks I'm weird for regularly attending GC). She's right.

[Khunanup]

I'd noted this before on the previous forum, and it's confirmed by our information on this one (and introductions on here) that myself, Anthony and the Dok were all born within three and a bit months of each other, were all in the same school year (in three completely separate places), two were born thirteen days apart in the same town (now city) and we're all from the North West. We also all joined the same party before our 21st birthday and are still members of that same party today. Are there any other similar school/calender years for same party members from this forum?

If I remember correctly, NeilM who I know did register on this forum and was quite active up until some time ago on the old one was in the same school year as well though of course he is a Tory.

[johnloony]

Feb 3, 2013 2:18:01 GMT Khunanup said:

I'd noted this before on the previous forum, and it's confirmed by our information on this one (and introductions on here) that myself, Anthony and the Dok were all born within three and a bit months of each other, were all in the same school year (in three completely separate places), two were born thirteen days apart in the same town (now city) and we're all from the North West. We also all joined the same party before our 21st birthday and are still members of that same party today. Are there any other similar school/calender years for same party members from this forum?

If I remember correctly, NeilM who I know did register on this forum and was quite active up until some time ago on the old one was in the same school year as well though of course he is a Tory.

In another forum I was active in a few years ago, we discovered that (out of an active membership of about 15 people) three members had parents who were married on exactly the same date in the same year.

[Deleted]

OK so here is mine

Born in April 1972 at Moseley Sorrento to a parent from Ladywood. Adopted at birth to parents who lived in Great Barr, lived there till I was 26 and moved about 400 yards away (all to do with location and not staying close to parents) and not moved since. Married 8 years ago with a little girl of 6.

For schooling went to the local Primary where I Did well put up for Grammar school entrance exams and deliberately failed them as they did not play football. Hated school did OK at GCSE's without either trying hard, went to 6th form same school did OK without really trying (except for Geography which I loved). No idea what to do at 18, went to Uni at Bristol for quantity surveying degree, hated it so dropped out after 6 months and on the dole for another 6 months.

It was at this point I really hated the Tory philosophy that branded everyone as failures and somehow it was my fault being unemployed.

So found myself on an ET course, (which ran out of money half way through) continued it (rushed BTEC in computing in 6 months) was given a pass for my efforts and work, only one to pass.

Then I found a contract job in 1990 with Itnet (ex Cadbury's) loading computer tapes for the whopping wage of £3 an hour. From then on moved jobs a bit always moving up until at TNT in 1998 and stayed then until my new job in London a few months ago and getting used to virgin everyday.

For politics joined Labour at around 95, left for a couple of years between 2001 and 2005, rejoined after 2005. Funny enough got really involved at our lowest ebb in 2008 but was always on the edge of things.

[Deleted]

Feb 7, 2013 17:18:05 GMT @ianrobo said:

Born [...] at Moseley Sorrento

Likewise. Reminds me of when I was living in Shetland next to an elderly lady who coincidentally was originally from Bournville. It emerged in conversation that we were both born in Sorrento, which confused the others present no end.