For starting the blogtag game which as Howard points out here is a pyramid scheme which is illegal in my country and elsewhere. This one however doesn't promise money but an overwhelming amount of useless trivia about people you don't know. As such it seems to me both an excellent bit of web 2.0 and harmless entertainment. Besides Lisa tagged me and she throws a mean glass of water. So 8 things you didn't know or want to about me.

1.  I'm married to a wonderful lady called Laura - she's a professional pedant, sorry patent attorney - given that I'm a dba we argue about the precise nature of words we are using when arguing, ever wanted to know the difference between constantly,continuously and continually - come to our house it's a blast.
2. I attend this church here. If you are ever in Basingstoke, and who would be voluntarily, come along we don't bite - much.
3. I started professional life as a bean-counter for KPMG. Consequently I'm a DBA who respects auditors, not least because they have to stand in unheated warehouses in the middle of winter watching other people count things- I know I was there.  
4. I have also extensively used microsoft technologies which makes me an Oracle-head who likes both Windows and SQL server. 
5. My grandfather played rugby in the early years of the 20th century for the Lansdowne Road rugby club 
6. Despite this I don't like rugby at all, much preferring 5 days of rain followed by no result.
7. Hearing the sound of automatic weapons fire, whilst pretty rare in the UK, is a regular part of life for me as I live no more than about 1/2 a mile from an area regular used by the SAS reserves for live weapons training.
8. I once ate a meal with 4 separate fish courses in Oslo - right here in fact. I thoroughly recommend it.  
9. I can't count!

Anyway  that's a bit of me. Now lets see if we can't poke Alex, Hans, Richard, Noons, Shrek and see what happens. - See I told you I couldn't count.