About me

First, and most importantly: my name is pronounced 'Rafe'. Not 'Ralf'. My grandfather was called Ralph, and I was named after him. Back then, 'Rafe' was the more common pronunciation of that name, but of course now it's 'Ralf'. Which is just great for me, because I don't live back then.

See him? Also called 'Rafe'.

I'm a .Net developer, looking for work. I recently finished a short contract at DERM (Dept. of Environment and Resource Management) at Mineral House, Brisbane CBD. That was so dissatisfying and frustrating that I had to go to Greece for 3 weeks. There I caught up with my reading, my blogging, and my going to tavernas, which in all cases I'd fallen behind on.

Reinstated in Queensland, I promptly installed .Net 4, converted my site (see next paragraph) to MVC3, and so far have done 3 interviews for .Net developer roles.

I've got two kids, Alexander and Eoin, and one wife, Tina. There's plenty of pictures of them (and me) on my Flickr. Tina's parents are from Zakynthos island, Greece, and they go back for a full 6 months biennially, so we've been going to Greece every two years since 2005, just for short, month-long holidays. I can speak baby Greek.

In my spare time I work at home on my own site, Connemara.net, which I've been doing since October 1996. I used to live in Connemara, Co. Galway, Ireland, and this site is one way I stay connected to that boggy wonderland. The code brings me home.

And this blog is my way of keeping track and explaining (mostly to myself) the ideas that I'm working on.

Zakynthos town