Interests
The things that hold my attention away from a keyboard. Some of these overlap with work. Most don't.
Aviation
I've been fascinated by aircraft for as long as I can remember. Not from a technical expert's standpoint, but as a genuine enthusiast. Getting on a plane is a pleasure; airports are the start of something good. I enjoy watching aircraft, particularly landings. The precision of a plane coming in low over a road, like the viewing spot beside Luqa airport in Malta, never gets old. The engineering is fascinating too, in a broad sense: the sheer improbability of a 500-tonne machine crossing an ocean reliably enough to be treated as routine.
Football
A devoted supporter, the kind who stays invested even when the results don't justify it, which is most seasons. I follow the tactical side as much as the scoreline: how teams set up, how managers adapt in-game, and what modern analytics is actually telling us that we couldn't see before. The season is long and I wouldn't have it any other way.
Science fiction
Good sci-fi uses imaginary futures to ask questions that would be uncomfortable to ask directly. The best of it (books, films, the occasional TV series) is ideas-driven rather than just action in space. I'm drawn to the hard stuff: the kind that stays with you because it actually meant something. Blade Runner 2049 holds up better than most sequels have any right to.
History
Particularly the 20th century. A hundred years that went from horses to the moon, managed two world wars, and got through it all faster than anyone at the start of it could have imagined. I find it clarifying. A lot of what I know about it has come through travel rather than books: visiting places and understanding what happened there makes it stick in a way that reading alone doesn't. The technology history is what I keep coming back to: radar, computing, aviation, nuclear power, all emerging in a single generation.
Travel
Getting somewhere unfamiliar is always worthwhile. There are places I've been and want to return to, places I haven't been and probably should, and a growing list that will require a long-haul flight, which only makes the aviation interest more relevant and entirely justified. The journey is part of it.
Technology
Tech doesn't stay at work for me. I run a homelab, follow hardware and software releases, and have an ongoing habit of building things primarily to understand how they work. The line between hobby and job is blurry, which is probably a good sign. The business of technology (the decisions behind why things are built the way they are) interests me as much as the engineering itself.
Film
Sci-fi is the favourite genre but the range is pretty wide. Some of the films I come back to most: Aliens, Back to the Future, The Martian, Iron Man, Harry Potter. On the series side: Ted Lasso, Breaking Bad, Afterlife, Band of Brothers, Only Fools and Horses, Red Dwarf. I'm not a completist and I don't track everything I watch, but the ones that stay with you are worth thinking about.