Hello, I’m Charlie O’Hara (not my real surname). I’m a middle-aged British woman living in Berlin, Germany. That’s the famous one, with the wall. Or lack of one.
Personal
I live with my wife and several guinea pigs in a lovely apartment that is far too small.
I’m a self-hosting nerd who likes to run her own infrastructure and apps wherever possible.
Tied in with that is being a home automation wanker. I enjoy automating my home with Home Assistant.
I’m trying to get better at building electronics, but until I can upgrade the size of this apartment I’m kinda stuck, as there’s no space to do tinkering. 😭
Despite appearing to be quite confident and outgoing I’m actually a major introvert who gets drained from social interaction. I therefore confuse people who don’t know me well by disappearing off to avoid events and crowds. This means I’ll often be found walking a city, or hiking anywhere nearby, while enjoying an audiobook or podcast. (If I had a dog, she’d be with me on every journey outside).
Professional
I make money to live on by being some kind of managerial leadership person in a big academic publisher. There I attend meetings and say things like “do we have an agenda for this meeting?” and “let’s circle back to that one”. Yes, I do hate myself, why do you ask?
This is of course very different to my previous career as a frontend web developer.
I’m a professional pessimist, always looking for what can go wrong. This makes me very unpopular in the aforementioned meetings.
Bonus facts
- I have voluntary control of my tensor tympani muscles.
- I have touched Richard E Grant’s little finger.
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