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I (Tom) was born in 1959 (when Dinosaurs still roamed the earth) in Rotterdam, the Netherlands (also called Holland). You can read more about our home country separately.
I was third of a litter of four, with an older sister and brother, and one younger sister. My parents are regular folks, so I guess that makes me a regular guy.
We moved quite a few times, but my fondest memories are of my own room in the attic where I could play my music loud without bothering anyone. Anyone that is, except for my own parents who had to pull a fuse to get me to come down for dinner.
After finishing high school, I attended college and graduated a civil engineer in 1980. For some reason however I wound up in IT and stuck with that. I think it's safe to say, that I won't be doing much civil engineering anymore... Much to the dismay of my parents at first though, but they have gotten used to it by now.
Music has always been my passion and I spent all my allowance on records, mostly from American and British bands. I grew up at a time when television was being influenced more and more by American TV shows. In hindsight I am very grateful for the fact that in my home country foreign TV shows were subtitled instead of dubbed over like in some other European countries. In this way, I learned English (and other languages) and improved my reading at the same time.
There is an anecdote about when John Wayne died: a lot of Germans were surprised to find out he was an American!
A third "sin" of mine was (and is) movies, and again mostly American. I just love American cinema, but not just any movie though, mind you! Like TV shows, movies were subtitled and this just helped me to advance my knowledge of the English language even further.
I remember an English lesson in high school when the teacher wanted to know if we knew any alternatives to "dare". In an instant I remembered one of my favorite TV shows and replied: "to have the guts". This was not the reply my teacher was looking for and mentioned that I watched too many detective shows on TV. I guess, she was right.
Trudy was born in a quaint little town called Delft in the Netherlands. Besides the fact that Delft if famous for its Royal Delft Blue china, it now is famous for producing the sweetest girl ever - as far as I'm concerned.
Trudy was the elder of two sisters. She grew up with her teenage companion Snoetje (Snoot-yuh), a big fluffy white Keeshond, whom she adored (read story S20).
After finishing high school Trudy graduated as a social worker, but wound up in IT just like me. We must have taken a wrong turn somewhere...
My first job is where we met: Trudy was a computer operator, I was a computer programmer. It was love at first sight, but it took some time before we had the guts (or dared) to admit that to each other. We got married in 1987 at the same day we received the keys to our first house.
I have never regretted hooking up with her and she is my rock of Gibraltar, well Delft actually, because that's where she is from. I think it's safe to say, that we will probably stay together... Let's be honest: who would have us now?
In 1988 we first visited Florida for our vacation and we spent many vacations in the US ever since. We have visited some 25 states and hope to make that 50 someday.
When I got a job offer to work in Silicon Valley in 1998, we did not have to think long to say yes. And so, here we are and we hope to stay.
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