Welcome to Don’s personal view of who he was, who he is today & who he might be in the future…
visit his
story
(see others below also) that share many of his life-long details!
Don is a cultured, married & retired Brit, today enjoying his computing work, DVR shows and his family,
all in a peaceful, pleasant country-setting, a few miles off of Atlanta, GA;
he arrived in the US in the late 1970’s on an international work visa, and holds a dual US/UK citizenship…
As the direct author of every person (some inherited/some imported) in Don’s family tree
that shows the 90+ generations of his grandparents (viewable in many of their names)
as well as their places
(view his place info page?),
their notes, the sources & citations (all downloaded),
many obtained quotations, episodic comments, pictures and such
(and yes, for *each and every* item)
the "Three of Himself" would like to share that they sure do like to write!!
Regards, Don
who may be "DJ" in this page…
Feel free to contact him? Cheers!
eMail: Don.J.Shave (use backspace to return?)
As this website is *strongly* biased towards Don’s early years, consider visiting some of his more-recent pages?
Open his
Facebook,
LinkedIn,
Tweeter
or
Flickr
pages,
or consider visiting his
Home Page,
his
profile
or his ongoing
eDiary
which has news reports?
Enjoy!!
Manually edited to eliminate those auto-generation glitches; other page updates may follow ;)
|
Don's Biography & an Overview of “just a few” of the Key Facts |
Birth |
Jul 1955 |
So… Don was born in the Boscombe HospitalG(part of Bournemouth, EnglandG) & was advised by his Mum (via some notes in a 1984 birthday card that she had painted for his 39th) that he had arrived at 4:55am on a Monday as a tiny baby
Don was also given to understand (unsure as to precisely when, but it was most likely prior to his birth) that he had been named after his 2 Grandfathers:
Donald
and
James
With a reported low birth weight of 5 pounds/5 ounces-ish, his
Dad
had once said that when he held him as a baby, it was like "a ball of string with 5 pieces attached" for those skinny arms & legs
The time & the size "facts" (from Don’s Mum) are also her numismatics for "5" being the most important number, apparently / NFIA…
Note: Bournemouth+was in Hampshire then, moving to Dorset in 19741,2 |
Death |
2075 |
Don's tree data actually shares a false fact: "I died in 2075 at 120 years of age"…
This virtual event allows Don's data to be shared with his online tools |
Story |
Apr 2016 |
Don wrote a story named
"Whom We Might Be"
several years back while living in Roswell, GeorgiaG… certainly worth a minute or two!
Today's Homo Sapiens research has the beginnings of our species far, far earlier than we had thought!
A recently-released research discovery of our earliest ancestors (see the report?) has pushed the date back by 60,000 years from what we had thought was 195,000 years ago (233k+/-22k years);
this work was done in the Omo Kibish Formation, an area in south-western Ethiopia within the East African Rift valley, where stratigraphic descriptions & sampling were carried out during two field seasons in 2017 and 2018
Clickto view the Homo Sapiens origins map & clickfor info on the story |
Historical fact | | Storage of the key relevant citations are listed below-also view the Region of The British Isles, EuropeGand refer to the Place location+for more information? |
Vital | April 1998 to today | Every element of Don's family tree is legally controlled:
All Rights Reserved © April, 1998-today’s date Don Shave4 |
Jamie's Childhood Years |
Name-Nickname | about Aug 1955 | As of early August in 1955, Don believes that he became known his to family as “Jamie”, most likely from his Dad; sadly, this is NFIA |
Residence | Jul 1955 to Sep 1955 |
Jamie lived as a tiny baby with his
Mum
&
Dad
in an upstairs flat at 10 Carlton Rd in BoscombeG for ~3 months…5 |
Historical fact |
Sep 1955 to Jan 1971 |
Jamie grew up at 70 Elmes Roadin Bournemouth for 14+ years…
With many-a-tale to tell, just a handful of shareable threads are added for this story-see more details
here,
and do take a peek at some of his older
photo album
snaps? Cheers! |
Historical fact |
Feb 1958-ish |
In February of 1958 or so,
Mum
would sit Jamie down (likely every day) to listen to the "Daily Radio Show" on BBC4 in the early afternoons;
those opening words still resonate clearly in his head after more than 50 years: "Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin…"
The show is
shared
here… |
Historical fact |
1959 |
Starting in about 1959 at the Winton LibraryG (which was built by Andrew Camegie in 1906) where Jamie recalls the commencement of being an *enthusiastic* reader of books, both fiction and factual…
Mum had read to him since he was born, and remembers being at the library with her very often-he did so love those boys adventure books!
See a snap of the reading room from the 50’s? |
Education |
28 Jul 1960 |
The year is solid but the date is an approximation; this was the start of Don's school life at the Winton & Moordown Infant’s School on Coronation Ave in Bournemouth, which was quite close to 70 Elmes Rd |
Historical fact |
1961 |
“Uncle Peter” (see notes at his page?) helped Jamie to learn how to tie the shoe-laces as his Dad hadn’t been able to do that…
Jamie can actively recall an event to avoid, learned at an early age (not precisely dated, but close enough…)
Whilst riding on a Dorset county bus with his
Mum
traveling somewhere for a day out,
he was seated on the "front seats" behind the driver facing the back of the bus, and he got sick and threw up! |
Description |
Mar 1962 |
Jamie recalls that he was always "busy at bedtime," drilling holes in the wall next to his bed (with a screwdriver) back then for reasons that simply cannot fathomed…
This *absolutely* infuriated his Dad as he kept doing it, despite Dad’s belt on his back…
right around the age of 6 or 7
Mum & Dad had taken in lodgers during this time (as cash was needed); in March Jamie had sneaked into Terry’s room when he was out, managing to steal his large pocket-penknife…
when it went to school with him the next day to boast about it, he was caught with it in his hand…
more of Dad’s belt |
Property |
Jun 1963 |
The Silk Jacket that Jamie’s
Dad
had brought home as a gift from his visit to New York city in the USA; he was working at that time as the chef for a ship in the Merchant Navy and went to many places around the world…
Just a few days later, Jamie managed to take it off (as it was too hot to wear!) while playing near his house at Redhill CommonGwhere it was picked up from where he had left it (hanging on a bush or just on the ground) and never came back to us…
It’s still burned into Don’s brain how *furious* his Dad was when he lost his gift :(
[ sourced from a passing thought on Fathers Day in 2018 ] |
Education |
28 Jul 1963 |
As Jamie moved up to the Middle SchoolG,
his
Mum
changed the registration name to “James Donald” in an attempt to redirect the bullies (Leslie Baldrey, et al) who made up that horrible teasing rhyme:
Donald Duck did some Muck, behind the Kitchen door…
Mother Duck cleaned it up and Donald did some more!
Her registration effort just didn’t work at all-they continued to follow him home from the school, chanting…
he distinctly recalls crying as he walked home with them following him along on Oswald Road |
Historical fact |
Nov 1963 |
Don's sister Dawn was sadly stillborn in June of 1963, causing this event…
His Mum became very depressed with this loss, and went away a few months later to ManchesterG+ with Peter in an attempt to help her sadness; see the 1963 notes in her profile? |
Historical fact |
early 1965 |
Jamie was caught red-handed shoplifting for his girlfriend Liz… a pocketful of dirt-cheap jewelry at a big store downtown in Bournemouth
This all ended up in a world of legal shite, with his Dad unsuccessfully asking the Chief of Police for mercy;
he ended up at the age of 10 with two years of probation which started "The Sad & Bad Years" |
Don's Teenage Years |
Description |
Jul 1965 to Dec 1970 |
The "Sad & Bad Years" were where Don literally managed to take his
Dad’s
world to the lowest of lows for him.
Worst ever was Don being a bully, beating up another child (who is sadly remembered, yet will remain unidentified), one of the many threads that caused him to be *evicted* from his Dad’s home in 1970 to join the British Army |
Historical fact |
Mar 1966 |
When Don was 11, the Winton & Moordown Middle School on Oswald Road delivered the "School Streaming Examinations," where students were graded to determine whether or not they would succeed with a Grammar School education
As the world was changing around this time, even though his scores were certainly high enough to qualify, there just wasn’t enough room at the Grammar School for everyone in our town…
He ended up being sent to the "G-stream" in the Winton and Moordown Senior School (likely due to geography, as much as anything) where he was eligible for O-levels there vs. just a CSE.
View an article of
historical
interest ? |
Residence |
1968 |
Don had a music studio at 70 Elmes Road for a couple years!
Just a lovely snap
that he found of the room that was completely his… it was decorated with pebble-style wallpaper,
had a comfy-ish bed (1/2 of a set of bunk-beds),
his red shirt hanging on the chair & his neck-tie hanging on the wardrobe handle,
and that "surround sound" system with a stack of singles (sadly no longer possessed / eSigh!)
with various other memories |
Occupation |
Jul 1967 to 1970 |
Don’s work as a youngster began around July 1968 once his probation (above) ended, with many sunny summer days spending time learning about the world of work…
compliments of his Dad, he supposes
Don had earlier delivered newspapers for about an hour on weekday mornings with a paper route from the local news shop;
managed to get sacked after a couple weeks as he’d decided to grab several bars of “free” chocolate to eat as he walked…
he can actively recall the shop owner following after him, picking up the discarded wrappers!!
Don then worked as a washer-upper of the dishes/knives/forks etc in the kitchens at the "Sea-Witch Restaurant" in Poole for a while, just a 30-minute bike ride from home;
they changed at some point to the "Loch Fyne Seafood & Grill Restaurant" and later became the
Anchorage Hotel,
which may or may not be currently active…
He also worked at that time with his
Dad,
helping him to maintain the gardens of the "rich people" who lived in the downtown Bournemouth area
and spent Saturday mornings working with his
Uncle Reg
at the family Tape Recorders shop in Bournemouth (which moved to the main street in Boscombe a few years later)
where his Uncle Reg taught him about soldering, transistors, electronic circuits & the resistor color
codes,
with a rhyme like "Betty Brown Rode Off You Get By Vera Good Wife Gold Silver"…
some invaluable knowledge for the work Don moved into as came out of the Army in 1978!
View a summary page of his life’s work here? |
Historical fact |
Jul 1968 |
Don's
Uncle Jack
&
Auntie Jean
gave him a gift for his 13th birthday, an Antique Postage Stamp Albumthat was printed many years ago, between Nov 1893 and Dec 1893.
Uncle Jack told Don that the album had been given to him by his father, Albert on his 10th birthday in 1934;
Jack then maintained and built up the album during his childhood years-see the details at Jack’s father, Albert Gabbutt?
The album remains today in a fireproof safe at Don’s house;
view a summary of the contents9 |
Historical fact |
1969 |
As Don wrote this 50-year-old diary entry in late 2018, the threads weren’t really in his head, just some captures from various sources…
Don was "Up to a Lot of No Good" out and about on Redhill Common, in Kinson and other places as he became 14 on a Friday in July of 1969,
with no recall at all as to what kinds of gifts might have been given to him by his
Mum,
Dad or
Uncle Peter,
and whether or not there was a party… it was likely that he was just out, making trouble
Don broke into the metalwork shop at the Oswald Road Senior School Annex with Johnnie Early and Dave Ellis late one night, likely in the spring. This was a real "pro job" where we planned the raid, knew what we wanted to take and where we were going to sell the stuff, etc, etc.
We had left an upper window during class just open enough to allow us to get back in later at night; we were just lucky that no-one had spotted and closed it!
We got in ~11pm (wearing gloves & soft-soled shoes, dark clothes, the works-regular crooks…) and raided the display case for all the brass and copper bowls, etc; a bagful of the stuff to lug out… we got halfway across the back playing fields before Dave realized that he had left his gloves with his name in!
We got away with the stuff ok, but Don then had a visit from the cops…they simply didn’t have anything to pin on him or on any of us.
We sold the junk later over in Boscombe for a few quid, and thought that this was the greatest thing… such youthful foolishness
During the summer Don broke into the Bournemouth School for Girls with Johnnie Early, looking for mercury to sell… heard sometime earlier that week at school that this stuff was very expensive-it simply never occurred to us that it wasn’t sellable in any shop we could go into!
This was the night that Johnnie cut himself with a damned scalpel, and we got a bunch of powder paint all over ourselves when trashing the place… his
Dad
was extremely suspicious when we got home
(and his Mum wasn’t around),
and when he returned from taking Johnnie home, he proceeded to say "OK, Johnnie told him the whole story; now he want your version!"
I was scared shitless, and ’fessed up the whole deal… of course, Johnnie hadn’t told him anything of the sort, and couldn’t believe that he had bubbled him.
We both ended up at the copshop that night, and Don’s
Dad
later told him that he had gotten the Chief Constable to "bend over backwards" to let him off of what was probably a serious charge… Don just hated his guts anyway for his lying to get a confession, and a few days later scarpered off (to Meyrick Park, in fact) one night
Johnnie and Don also broke into the Glenmore Girls School that summer, and nicked a couple of cello’s becoming the "music men" for an evening.
He sold them somewhere, or maybe just smashed them up…
Don saw no cash out of it either way! |
Description |
Sep 1970 |
Don ended up as the 2nd kid to be expelled from the 5G class (after Jules Stravinsky) for being a problem child at the Winton & Moordown Senior School in mid-September, 1970…
He recalls that his Dad knew not what to do with this, perhaps the final “straw on the camel’s back”? Who will ever know… |
The Army Apprentices College in Harrogate |
Description |
15 Dec 1970 |
Don was signed up for the Army by his Dad on December 15, 1970 at the British Army Recruitment Office on 244 Holdenhurst Road in BournemouthG
This was after his Dad’s seemingly endless futile attempts to try and keep Don off of the road that he was on to become a criminal (possibly from his own childhood learning),
with his school eviction event (above) being Dad’s final choice (not actually spoken to me, but surely true enough…) "Let's have someone else give it a try as I clearly can't influence him enough…" |
Military |
Jan 1971 to Apr 1973 |
On Friday, January 15th, 1971, Don arrived as a young Army rookie at the Army Apprentices CollegeGin Harrogate, Yorkshire, EnglandG and spent the next 2+ years of his life in the Bradley Squadron there
Many, many memorial events occurred while he was there… Don was
playing on the rugby team as the tight-head prop,
hitting the marching-band big base drum (slowed down as he recalls),
walking the 48-hour Lyke-Wake walk across the Yorkshire Moors,
after walking into town (about an hour), discovering his 1st formal knife-fork-spoon table-setting as we sat in a restaurant (late-summer of 1971),
taking those horrible cross-country runs, and
having those massive PT sergeants screaming in his ear that he “wasn’t trying hard enough with those damned reverse curls!”14 |
Historical fact |
About September 1970 |
After Don was at Harrogate for a while, a phone protocol with his Mum was established at 70 Elmes (my home) for a series of weekly calls on Saturday… at one specific phone (of the 3 phone booths near to the churches), he’d ring up around lunchtime, hanging up after letting it ring 3 times… it never failed (to his recollection) to get a call-back, reducing his expenses!
Don was promoted in October, 1972 to an Apprentice Lance-corporal of the A-Troop and again in January, 1973 to the A-Troop Corporal with the Corporals Bunk; a snap of many friends and some memories are here6 |
Graduation |
Apr 1973 |
Don graduated from the AAC with four top-of-the-class achievements, something never done before or since…
view the info here? |
Army Life in Soltau, West Germany |
Residence | Apr 1973 to May 1973 | After graduating from the AAC, Don lived for a month or so in the barracks at the Catterick Garrison in Yorkshire, EnglandG as a squaddie; this was en route to his station in Soltau |
Military | May 1973 |
He traveled via a military plane (his 1st flight!) from Stansted Airport to Hanover in West GermanyG and then onwards to Soltau
Stansted Airport (on Bassingbourn Rd in Stansted, England) is an international airport in the district of Uttlesford in Essex, 42 mi northeast of Central London and 0.9 mi from the Hertfordshire border
As a note of interest, West Germany had existed since the end of WWII, where the Potsdam Agreement had established the exact delimitation of Germany’s East and West postwar boundaries; the country was reunified on October 3rd, 1990 |
Military |
May 1973 to Nov 1974 |
Don served as a squaddie for a year & 1/2 in the Bournemouth Barracks of the 7th Armoured Brigade HQin Soltau, West GermanyG |
Military |
Nov 1974 to Mar 1975 |
Don took a 4-month tour at the RUC Station on Hastings St. in Belfast, Northern IrelandG as a comms.op for the Brigade HQof the King’s Own Royal Border Guards; he lived and worked there his friend, Dave Cleminson
Don had a few scares during that time: guard duty as the highly-frightening courier "shotgun" ride-along (who gets shot 1st) w/military papers up to the main HQ; was lucky enough to have missed things like the bombing of the RUC Station in July, 1971
A few months prior to this, several of us were providing training for the troops in Soltau; see the note & info on the KORBG here? |
Historical fact |
Saturday, April 19th, 1975 |
On a Saturday afternoon in the Eastleigh Baptist churchG, Don &
Jane
were
married
with family and friends |
Historical fact |
Apr 21st to 28th, 1975 |
A few days after our marriage, we took our honeymoon in the Isle of WightG+ |
Residence |
30 Apr 1975 to Jan 1977 |
We then moved to our 4th-floor MQ flat at Amselweg 4 in Soltau, West GermanyGfor 2 & 1/2 years; we also had a short visit at Paul & Julie’s place as we arrived!
Click to view some of the memories:
|
Historical fact |
May 1976 to Jun 1980 |
Working at the barracks in Soltau, Jane made us some extra income, allowing the purchase of our Hillman Huskythat was sold in 1980, right before Don moved away to the US |
Don's Disastrous Life-changing Accident in August, 1976 |
Medical |
Aug 1976 |
Don's life-changing event occurred in late August, out in the countryside near Stadtverwaltung, about 50km SE of Hanover in Bad Salzdetfurth, Hildesheim, West GermanyG…
Sgt. Gary Coude & Don were out & about, playing soldiers-Don ended up taking a swan-dive from the top of our 432
(trying to release the coolant from the overheated radiator) which fractured both his elbows & wrists as he hit the road on them;
that sad event changed the rest of his natural-born life |
Medical |
Oct 1976 |
In October, 1976 (around 6 weeks *after* the actual event) Don was admitted to the British Military Hospital (BMH) in Hanover, West GermanyG for medical care… they worked on a few things, ending up surgically removing the radial head of his left elbow in January, 1977 |
Historical fact |
Christmas, December 1976 |
Don’s Dad drove (via the ferry) with his Mum & brother Alan (age 8) to visit us for a few days
(snapshot);
we spent an afternoon at the nearby concentration camp,
Bergen-Belsen…
click to viewG?
|
Historical fact |
Jan 1977 to Apr 1977 |
Don was transferred to BMH Greenwich in LondonG+(the Royal Herbert Hospital) from Soltau after his treatments in BMH Hanover, spending a period living there in the wards; he recalls meeting up with "Ginger" (who was from the Kings Own Royal Border Guards tour in Belfast) at some point during the stay-he cannot recall what had happened to Ginger but suspects he was shot in the leg
Jane & Don also departed from their Soltau MQ at this time, driving our Hillman Husky to her parents house in EastleighG via the English Channel ferry from Hamburg to Harwich; we spent ~3 months in a small upstairs room there
Don distinctly recalls Captain Sweetman probing his plan to drive with both elbows out of whack… concerned that Don would not be able to control the steering wheel in an emergency condition-he managed (thank Christ!) to successfully argue the case… |
Medical |
May 1977 to Oct 1977 |
After his time at BMH Greenwich, Don was transferred to the JSMRU, the Joint Services Military Rehabilitation Unit in Chessington, LondonGfor further treatment
In the ~6 months he spent there (originally an Elizabethan farmhouse) with the therapy of working in the pool with floats a couple times a day, he actually spent carpentry time to build a usable table… it was in place at our middle-floor flat at 103 Central Hill in Upper Norwood (see below) and stayed with us as we moved on to our Albany Road house (below).
Don has a number of other memories of his time there… a sadly brain-damaged lad who would chase after a physio girl, drooling; a guy named "Jock" without his left leg, clicking along the road; a discussion "Shall we just downgrade him to a clerk?" with subsequent (desperate!) discussions to try to avoid this!
Don spent some time near the end of his treatment with a selection of possible retraining class(es), specifically Computers which became his life…
Today, the JSMRU no longer exists as it was sold off by the MOD in 2004; a replacement was built in 2008 |
Residence |
Mar 1977 to Oct 1977 |
While Don was stationed at the JSMRU, we were assigned to our 1st UK MQ, a 5th-floor placeon the Balham High Road in LondonGwhere Don drove to the JSMRU and back while Jane worked as a nurse
We had to travel back to Soltau for a few days in April to hand back our MQ; our return to home was via Holland, where the tulip fields were endlessly amazing! |
The Transition to Civilian Life |
Military |
10 Oct 1977 |
On a Monday at the Catterick Garrison in Yorkshire, EnglandG Don received his medical discharge after spending ~18 months with many, many doctors, who had unsuccessfully attempted to fix his broken arms…
He was also tagged as 30% disabled, which today still provides a small pension |
Residence |
12 Oct 1977 to Mar 1978 |
After Don’s final Army discharge, we moved from our Balham MQ to our 1st personal middle-floor flat at 103 Central Hill, West Norwood, LondonGspending ~6 months there
This address was actually captured from a copy of a letter that was sent to Don by his friend, Kim Nott in 1977; he’d retained the envelope, and shared that with Kim |
Historical fact |
Oct 1977 to Mar 1978 |
Don was luckily enough with his discharge to have been funded by the UK government for a 6-month stint at the Control Data Institute (CDI) in London for no cost, learning about computers and then graduating with honours!!
In perhaps November of 1977 (the date is of necessity approximate, but is close) he was traveling beneath Brixton in LondonGon the tube up to the CDI in London and back, where Don recalls a specific moment when he simply got lucky: wearing his long brown coat, he was being pushed around near the tube door (not at all crowded in the tube) by what was likely a thug… the thug’s friend did say "he’s big" so perhaps that was why they decided to not kick the shit out of him…guess we’ll never know!
Before graduating from the CDI, Don had started searching for a job, resulting in a successful interview with his 1st non-Army job at the Burroughs Corp.
The team worked in the Midland Bank HQ at Staples Corner in London, off of the Edgeware Rd at the North CircularG
Tim Bowler, who had assessed Don’s mechanical aptitude to successfully disassemble/reassemble a huge printer transfer box (full of dust & rust!),
Pete Tinson (Don’s shift boss to-be) and others liked him enough to offer a job with 12-hour shifts on a 4-4-6 day rhythm! |
Occupation |
Mar to Aug 1978 |
Worked at the HQ of the Midland Bank in N. London; to be closer to Staples Corner, we moved into to our 2nd flat upstairs at 89 Fairfax Road in Haringey, London (a couple of miles from the Alexander Palace)Gin late March, about 20 minutes away from work |
Address |
Aug 1978 to Dec 1979 |
Don &
Jane
brought our 1st house (an end-row terrace) at 19 Albany Road in Upper Edmonton, and moved in during August of 1978; we lived there for a year & a half… his drive to work was around the North Circular for 20-30 minutes
Today’s Google street viewGshows that our house & 4 others were knocked down as part of the construction of an Anglican Church school, which opened in 2017; a rear entry can be seen |
Historical fact |
6 Oct to 27 Nov 1979 |
Don was sent to the Burroughs Training Center in Paoli, Pennsylvania, USAGfor a 6-week training course that managed to lead to a disaster in his life…
When he returned, Don had to move out of their Albany Road house to a flat at 33a Goldsmith RoadGwhere he stayed alone for 8+ months |
Don's Transition to the USA |
Arrival |
9 Jul 1980 |
Having departed from London late in the evening on Wednesday, July 9th in 1980 after living with the many, many unmentionable events that occurred over the last several months, Don arrived for the 3rd time with his UK passport at the JFK airport in New YorkGin the afternoon, hauling a pair of suitcases that were each heavily-filled with his entire life that had been carefully filtered prior to his departure…
A sad, sad day, retrospectively |
Occupation |
11 Jul 1980 |
Don moved from the job that he had in the basement of a national bank in London, England to working on *exactly* the same things (i.e. the 7700 computers) in the basement of the World Bank HQ+ in Washington, D.C, USAG |
Address |
11 Jul 1980 to Nov 1981 |
We moved into our 1st apartment, a 4th-floor place at 14111 Castle BoulevardGin Silver Spring, MarylandGstaying for a year or so
Don changed jobs at this time from Burroughs to Fairchild Industries, working there for the next few years
(see his history
here?)
|
Immigration |
15 May 1981 |
On Friday, May 15th, Don was blessed to receive his Green Card from the Immigration office in BaltimoreGwhich after living for 10 months as a tourist made him a resident of the USA… this remained in place for 320 months until his Naturalization was completed on Thursday, April 19th 2007 (see the event below) |
Address |
Nov 1981 to Jul 1986 |
We found and rented our 1st US split-level house in Sterling Park, Virginia,Gmoving out of our Castle Boulevard apartment in November 1981; we lived there for 2 years, with Don working for Fairchild
We then found & purchased a newly-built end-row townhouse with a basement at 11483 Brundidge Terrace in Germantown, MarylandG, moving in around Nov 1983, where we spent 2 1/2 yrs |
Occupation |
Mar 1985 |
Don started his Creative Logic Software business as a Consultant |
Don's Transition to working with GE in Wisconsin |
Residence |
Jul 1986 |
Don drove (overnight, ~780 miles) from their house in Germantown to Waukesha, Wisconsin over the July 4th weekend,
moving into the Monterey Apartments+as he started working at GE1 |
Occupation |
Jul 1986 to Jan 2009 |
Don worked at GE HealthcareGin Waukesha, Wisconsin for 23+ years…
After starting out with a 6-month CLS contract where Don was working on some complex embedded firmware for the internals of an imaging device, he was offered a full-time job as a Senior SW Engineer in December ’86, which he accepted.
He evolved over time to become an equivalent to a Black-Hat Computer Wizard,
growing from his coding and team-lead roles to Manager,
taking on a parallel role as a Program Leader,
and then moving on as a Compliance Champion and to many others;
tales of some of these may be told when Don finds some time!
We then moved our family from Germantown to a rented half of a duplex at 21550 Jill Court in WaukeshaG in February 1987 and later found and purchased a house at 146 E. Greenland Ave in Oconomowoc, WisconsinGm, moving there in May 1998; the house is a 100-year old Cape Cod with a really nice lake view (!) and access to the lake… was our house for 6+ years until Don decided he had to move on |
Don’s Transition away from Ms. T |
Historical fact |
Mar 1994 |
In late March of 1994 Don was blessed to find himself connected with Sandy (his wife-to-be at that time);
we were working together at a trade show in Coronado, San Diego County, CaliforniaG
and both of our lives were delightfully changed forever by this event-we were married out there 3 years later on a Saturday, March 22nd, 1997 |
Residences |
1994 to 2014 |
Without sharing too many of the transitions over our many years together, Don moved out of his Greenland Ave house to an apartment in Hartland, Wisconsin, living there for 9 months;
we (Sandy & Don) then rented a Lake Keesus house near Sussex, WisconsinG for 6 months
Around Don's 41st birthday, we purchased & moved into our house on White Oak Drive in Sussex, WisconsinG, a mature, large 4-bedroom house on an acre with nice woods (and skeets!), a basement, etc where we lived for 7+ years with many visits from friends and from all of our children |
Medical |
May 1998 |
In early May of ’98 Don was unexpectedly diagnosed with a Brain Tumor; the link shares some details? |
Naturalization |
19 Apr 2007 |
Don became a naturalized citizen of the United States on Thursday, April 19th 2007 in the Court House in Milwaukee, WisconsinG allowing the end of his Green Card time |
Transitioning to Our Home in Georgia, USA |
Address |
16 Oct 2014 to date |
We moved our lives south to the State of Georgia as our 2nd grandson was about to be born, renting a house for a year on Wittenridge Drive in Alpharetta, GeorgiaG and then purchasing and moving into our current house on Walnut Terrace in Roswell, GeorgiaG |
Historical fact | August 2017 | Don & Sandy purchased a Toyota Highlander that has heating / cooling seats(!) and a few years later an electrical car, a Nissan Leaf |
Historical fact |
2018 |
On a Friday morning of January 5th, 2018, a thought trotted through Don's mind as he stood up from the computer after working for an hour or so with a little groan… "better to be old than to be dead" - such a *great* philosophy!!
He then searched for the phrase and found that George Clooney had said a couple years back that "…I'm kind of comfortable with getting older because it's better than[…]being dead" / sure felt nice to be aligned with someone famous ;)
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Historical fact | May 2019 | Don & Sandy spent 3 weeks in Italy,G where we caught several images; some are added here |
Historical fact | September 2023 | Sandy & Don took a 2-week+ trip to celebrate Steve Kerr's birthday in Scotland; see the trip
here?
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A couple final thoughts… |
Title |
back a few years |
Don’s grandson
Max
(who was just 4 years old back then) named him as "Grampy Don," a title that he’s today proud to bear! |
Historical fact |
today |
Ahhhh!
Don’s life in full-retirement began in 2012 (and continues today) in Roswell, Georgia… simply loads ;) of full-time Thumb-Twiddling!!
Thanks for your visit / hope you enjoyed it!!
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