neilbaxter4

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I was born in England, but grew up in the central interior of British Columbia - the land of long, face-numbing winters and too short summers. There were a couple of benefits from living there however, got to play hockey, and got to read - a lot. I read Ayn Rand at 18 and it changed the way I lived my life, but at that time she hadn't much changed the world around me. Oh, she's not the only one, there have been many more teachers than Ayn, but it started with Ayn Rand. I moved to LA in 1979 and did some stuff to unfreeze my frozen soul - I got Nathaniel Brandened and Radixed into the warm, cuddly person I am now. Not long after I came back to Canada, I became involved in the Canadian Libertarian party, and became the campaign manager of candidate in a federal election. First time out, we got 7% of the popular vote in the local campaign. Unfortunately, the national campaign didn't do so well, and the election laws were quickly changed to make it very difficult for minor parties to run. We had limited resources, but we took out a full page add and published the Libertarian Party Platform. When I went from door to door campaigning, I was surprised at the reaction of the people we canvassed. Most people had read it, and a large proportion agreed with it entirely or mostly. When asked if they would voter for us, the answer was mostly no, that they agreed with us in principle, but it was more important to get Trudeau out of office, so they would vote Conservative. We asked them if they thought that the Conservatives represented these principles, and they said mostly, "No." So we responded, "If no-one ever votes for their principles, how will we ever achieve them?" It was gratifying that we did very well in the areas we got to canvas, but we were few in numbers and poor in resources. Still, it was fun, a huge amount of work, but ultimately disappointing because of the changing rules. During that period I became a Financial Controller of several businesses, then became a Systems Engineer, then a Programmer and Web Developer. I never really enjoyed working for other people that much, no matter what the type of work was. I would ultimately always feel constrained and frustrated, but I do enjoy my current business arrangement Myself and my partners have a rather unusual business structure, we each work from our own homes and we manufacture and market commercial grade products for the satellite communications industry - I do the electronic marketing and the administration. I also love music and movies. I love Rachmaninov, Tchaikovsky, Borodin, Wagner, Saint Saens, Greig, Dvorak, Rodrigo, Puccini, and many other classical composers, but I also enjoy Paul Simon, Leonard Cohen (if someone else is singing!), and a scattering of pop, show and jazz music. My own music is on my personal website: www.totaleclipsemusic.com. My favorite movies include Amadeus, The Fountainhead, V for Vendetta, The Lives of Others, Dead Poets' Society, Good Will Hunting, A Beautiful Mind, The Winslow Boy, Enigma, Possession, The Black Book, Something the Lord Made, Lorenzo's Oil, The Phantom of the Opera, Gilda, Dark City, Momento, Contact, and many, many more. But the piece of art that has moved me the most is Les Miz. I was completely taken by surprise by the great and powerful story of Hugo, and the thrill of multiple charcters singing their inner thoughts, motivations and feelings simultaneously - and because it is in the form of music, one can hear and process all of their inner thoughts and feelings simultaneously. The night I went, the entire audience was choked up and in tears. What else can you do with art? So I guess I'm saying is that you can tell who I am by what I love and what I do.

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