Hello and welcome. This is the home page of an ordinary overweight balding middle-aged man who likes playing with computers. I am now going to let him revert from third to first person so that he can tell you a bit about himself...
My name is Simon Phillips and I live in Leamington Spa Warwickshire, England (population approximately 50,000). It's a Regency town of the Georgian period. (The Georgian period is generally taken to be from 1714 to 1837 and splits neatly into three: Palladian 1714 - 1760, Adam 1760 - 1790 and Regency 1790 - 1837). It has splendid stucco fronted buildings and wide elegant streets originally designed for a horse and carriage to turn around in without having to reverse - now useful for motor cars to do same. Its success was based around its spa springs, the water from which was pumped into baths for hypochondriacs and ill people to soak in or drink so as to get better (allegedly). You can still taste the water today which is salty.
In 1830 Queen Victoria visited Leamington Spa as a young Princess and was so impressed that she later bestowed it with a Royal charter from which date on it became Royal . Little did she realise at the time how confusing this would become for people trying to look the place up in the index of a map or book as it suddenly became placed under either 'R' or 'L' depending on the whim of the publisher and of course Murphy's Law applied in that whatever letter you started to look for it in, it was under the other.
What Good Came
From Leamington Spa?
It's the place where lawn tennis was invented and where the father of Frank Whittle lived - inventor of the jet engine.Okay So Where Is It?
Would it help you to place it if told you that it's about 12 miles north of Stratford-Upon-Avon, the birthplace of William Shakespeare or that it's 10 miles south of Coventry, the place where Lady Godiva rode a horse through the streets without any clothes on - Lady Godiva that is, not the horse! Still don't know where it is? All right then it s on an island on the Atlantic Ocean known as Great Britain or the United Kingdom.My Family
I am married to Angela Clancy and we have a three year boy called Daniel. I have some photographs of us if you're interested.My Computer
I own a Macintosh computer. Currently I have a Power Mac 4400/160 (as pictured) and am (like most Mac owners) devoted to it. I have owned many different types of computer including a Sinclair Spectrum 48k, an Amstrad Personal Computer Wordprocessor (PCW) running CP/M and a MS-Dos/Windows compatible PC. In 1991, however, I was introduced to an Mac computer and I fell in love with it but I shall desist from further comment as I do not want to start a 'my computer is better than your computer' debate. Some of my best friends own MS-DOS/Windows compatible computers!
My Job
I work for the Vehicle Inspectorate as a Traffic Examiner. The Vehicle Inspectorate is a central government road safety enforcement agency and operates throughout the UK. It is based in Bristol and employs 1,680 staff with a turnover of about 55 million pounds a year.Poetry Corner
One of my interests is poetry so I have done a page of my favourite poems. If you are in a masochistic mood, try reading some of my own efforts at writing poetry but understand that I cannot accept liability for what is, after all, only words.Other Interests
I write short stories and play the guitar.
I can be contacted at
Simon Phillips
<[email protected]>
