I am the same age as Sean Connery and Clint Eastwood.
\nIn Dog-years that is really really ancient.<\/p>\n
I am shorter than either, but heavier than both. I am not sure if that makes up for it.<\/p>\n
I was once the captain of the school basketball team. But it was in the UK and we didn’t have pom-pom girls.<\/p>\n
Here I am on the diving boat in Italy. The man with the beard was Reg Vallintine: once the British Spearfishing champion; he could swim down over 30m on one breath. I could only do 20m.<\/p>\n
One day we found a Etruscan wreck near the harbour. It was over 2000 years old, and at the time the oldest wreck ever found. They made a TV about it, and a book (Tarquin’s Ship<\/b> Alexander McKee).<\/p>\n
The man behind was an Italian called Constantino who helped with the boat; he was always friendly. I thought he was a fisherman One day when getting the boat refueled Reg noted he never paid for the gas. Constantino said he didn’t need to because he owned the gas station. I later discovered he was a millionaire.<\/p>\n
The girls come with the job.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I once lived on a desert island called Zembra in North Africa. I taught scuba diving. I was twice nearly bitten by sharks, and had a friend who was killed by a shark.
\nThis is me with one of my students In Tunisia who I taught to dive.
\nHer name is Dominique. She spoke several languages; was a qualified pilot, and a racing car driver.
\nShe learnt quickly.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I went almost totally deaf in a diving accident, but I can hear well with hearing aids.<\/p>\n
I once lived on a sheep farm in Australia. I slept in an old chicken hut. I learnt to shoot rabbits for the sheep dogs. I was quite good.<\/p>\n
I also dug ditches on the railway there. Later I worked making cosmetics. I became allergic to scents and never went out with ladies who wore scents as it made me sneeze.
\nAfter making scents I worked as a lab technician taking X-rays of clay minerals.
\nWe studied a mineral called Vermiculite which expands tremendously when you heat it; it is used for insulation and fireproofing.
\nHere is a picture of me as a lab technician.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
It was taken in 1954 when the transister was invented (I think). It introduced me to computers as the laboratory got all the latest science manuals.
\nEight years later (1962) I went to New York to write about computers, and eight years after that (1970) I won one in a New Scientist competition for predicting that one day films would be made with computers, and showed a piece of punched tape to explain what they would look like.<\/p>\n