Born (and raised) in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. As a lad, I was far smaller than others my age (I didn't sprout up or fill out until grade 10... and I'm likely too "filled out" right about now!) so I was too small for Little League baseball, Pop Warner (American) football or youth basketball. Soccer, being the extremely lovely and Democratic game that it is, gave me the chance at athletics... and I fell in love with the game. Played it right up through Junior Varsity in High School, and have been watching it all my life (which, until recently, has been a real challenge here in the US). I've always loved English football, but never followed or cheererd for a particular team... until now. I recently got digital cable TV, which included Fox Soccer Channel... and with it, a cornucopia of Premiership games. I also recently read a book by Chuck Culpepper, "Bloody Confused." It was the author's autobiographical story of an American ex-pat who moves to England and decides to "adopt" a side for which to cheer. He decides on PFC (for reasons I won't go into here) and writes about his experiences with his fellow Pompey fans and his travels to home and away matches. (He also forbids Yanks to root for any of the Big Four and equates Southampton and their supporters with Satan' minions.) At any rate, he made Pompey supporters sound like a right bunch of blokes, so I "adopted" Pompey as my Premiership rooting interest from this side of the pond. Oh, and as for my "real life": I work for a large US Government Agency (to keep body and soul together), but my passion is playing drums in a local pub band. Married, no kids, and my patience-of-a-saint wife not only puts up with my passion for football, she actually quite enjoys a match herself.