Do The Right Thing

Hello. My name’s Karl. I’m 36 37 38, and live next to the sea (I mean really, right next to the sea) in the often really cold North East of England. I’ve been married for 13 14 years, and have one daughter, and a huge dalmation.

Some more interesting facts about me:

1. I actually wrote the Mr Man story, Mr Noisy. No really, I did. We had a very noisy neighbour when I was five, and our class wrote the story of this and sent it off to Roger Hargreaves . . . a couple of months later, there it was, published. Not that I ever got a penny. But at least I have the satisfaction of knowing that I did it.
2. I once did a [short] stint as a semi-professional stripper. Degrading, I know. I gave it up because the audience laughed too much (also, going into the bar afterwards, and being refused service as I obviously had no money on me to pay for my drinks was rather a drawback.)
3. I REALLY like skiing. A fewdays after my first week in the mountains, I had my annual appraisal with my then boss. At the end, he asked me what I wanted to do long term for a carreer. My instant reply was, “Well, work’s OK, but I’d much rather go skiing for three months of the year. That’s expensive though, so I’ll need a job that pays at least fifteen months worth - what can you do?“. His derisive dismissal still drives me to make this a reality.
4. I took my wife’s name when we married. Well, actually a year after - I thought I wouldn’t mind not sharing a name, but I did. And I couldn’t ask her to do something I wasn’t prepared to do myself.
5. As a result of pool-side high-jinks, I ended up in the wrong end of a swimming pool when I was eight, and couldn’t swim. One of the kids I was playing with pulled me out. Thank you. I used to do sub aqua at school, but gave it up in the end - after about 30 minutes under water, I’d get a serious dose of THE FEAR. These two facts are probably not unrelated.

My background’s in engineering and production management - I was a Chartered Engineer at 27, and completed an MBA at Durham four years ago. Right now, I run a small management consultancy, specialising in helping organisations to improve their efficiency.

I’ve always ben fairly physically active - from cycling and cross-country running at school, a half-marathon between drinks as a student, and regular periods of running. OK, it was jogging really - no racing. When I moved to the North of England, I started running a little more seriously. There were a couple of years doing the Great North Run (the world’s biggest half marathon), but I soon got diverted from this when I discovered skiing.

The three years ago, I accepted my tall friend Robbie’s challenge of the Stratford 220 Triathlon. I liked it a lot, so did two more that year.

This year, I’m back on triathlon - my aim is to move up from sprint distance to Olympic . . . and perhaps to half or even full Iron Man in a year or two. You never can tell.

Digg! this story.