25 random facts about me

It seems to eb doing the rounds at the moment - so here, after seeing it on other blogs, are my 25 random facts.

1. I was actually born in Weiberg, West Germany, but only lived there for about four months before my father was posted back to the UK. So, if you go by birthplace, I'm German, but I'm not.

2. In my first year at school, I played one of the seven dwarves in a school panto - and my older brother was one of the prince's attendants.

3. The first song I ever learned to sing was "Morningtown Ride" by The Seekers.

4. I also sang in school and church choirs, but when my voice borke it broke in spectacular style.

5. I have a fear o fdogs, mainly because when I was eight I was attacked by one when I was walking along a wall near my home. Broken Arm, mangled ear and lacerations - but I still made it to the shop where I was going to buy some things.

6. Since childhood, I have been able to eat almost anything - except shellfish and ox toungue.

7. I turned down the chance to be a steward on the route for the wedding of Charles and Diana.

8. I actually gained the Queen's Badge in the Boys' Brigade, and trained to be an officer in the organisation.

9. I and two friends won a business competition in our last year at school - despite none of us studying Economics or Accounting.

10. There have been two serious relationships in my life - and I married the second of those.

11. The most embarresing thing I did at University was to ask the DJ at a party I wa sat to play a song because I thought we all needed to chill out. The song was "Relax" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood.

12. As a child, I actually appeared in a couple of schools programs for BBC Scotland.

13. I applied to four universities to attend. One was Edinburgh, which rejected me without an interview - mainly because I put it below Stirling University in my order of preference.

14. My father was in the company that discovered Belsen.

15. I have cooked dinner for James Fox and his family - but it was twenty years ago when he was a worker at a Christian university group.

16. When I first submitted my Doctorate thesis and went through the examination, I failed - not because of the content of the work, but because the standard of the English was not good enough.

17. The first computer I ever used was a BBC Micro - with a 12" disk drive.

18. I have a ferret sticking up my nose.

19. My wife, Doreen, got better grades in mathematics at school than I did - and I'm the one working as a statistician!

20. I proposed to Doreen in the second carriage of a train from Newcastle to Kilmarnock, via Carlisle, in May 1989.

21. In a previous job, when redundancies were announced I went to my boss and offered to jump if my name was in the frame, which I knew it would be. He said not to do so and wit it out. My name was picked - and I ended up with an extra eight weeks redundancy money as a result.

22. My favourite books are "To Kill A Mockingbird", "Les Miserables", the complete stories of Jeeves and Wooster and the Complete Sherlock Holmes stories.

23. The stupidest thing I ever did for charity was a twelve hour sponsored bin sit - in the middle of winter. I was ill for two weeks afterwards.

24. I have run a half marathon in one hour fifty minutes, and some day I may do it in under two hours again.

25. I enjoy writing, even if I'm not very good at it.