My name is Owen. I am 61 years old, retired and very happily married with two adult children who have left home to live their own lives. I live in Chester, quite a small city on the border between England and Wales in the United Kingdom. Chester is about 30km south of Liverpool.

I enjoy the arts, I listen to a lot of music and I still enjoy my phography. I like to keep up to date with current affairs, and I’m interested in knowing more about the various peoples of the world – their history, culture, etc.

I take an interest in environmental matters and I have always enjoyed travel. As my wife is also retired, we are taking the opportunity to do some travelling, although climate change concerns do make us very midful of the carbon emissions the travel causes.

I like to eat good food, and I enjoy cooking. I practice yoga and go to the gym to try to keep fit and healthy, and I walk a lot.

In my working life I worked in big business for many years – multi national companies – and I travelled extensively within Europe and to other parts of the world. I left that world behind me in 2015 to run a part-time photography business and work with a local charity which supports disabled people. I retired full-time at the end of 2023.

Why do I have this blog?

It’s a good way of sharing things will my friends around the world without being boring.

I like to chat with people, and you have to do that to grow and maintain a friendship whether in person, by video or by text. I hope this blog helps me keep those conversations fresh and interesting.

I don’t know if you find this yourself, just like when I am at a party (or a networking event if you are in business) if I am talking about the same thing to lots of people at the same time it begins to get a bit stale and repetitive, which is really not fair on my friends.