I'm Sue Hopkins and I work as a cataloguer for Essex Libraries and spend all my time at work and a lot of my time at home peering at a computer screen.

I have the car radio, the kitchen radio and the radio alarm all tuned to Classic FM which probably tells you quite a bit about me. I became a grandmother in July 2006, which gives you a few more clues.

I also spend time working on a voluntary basis for Brentwood Cathedral Music where I have catalogued the library of vocal scores, and have during the last twelve years, produced all the concert programmes and posters, published various newsletters, and developed the web site.

I grew up in the South of England. Having been born in Winchester, I moved around with my parents for the next seven years following my father's jobs, to Blean in Kent, Pertenhall in Bedfordshire, Leatherhead in Surrey, before settling in Sussex, in the area of Midhurst - first at Iping, then at Trotton (where I sang in the Church Choir), and finally in Midhurst itself. I attended Midhurst Primary School, and then went on to Midhurst Grammar. I sat my A-levels in 1967 and secured a place at York University to read English starting in October 1968. I worked for a while at the start of 1968 at the King Edward VIII Sanatorium near Midhurst, then packed my bags and flew off to Belgium and Switzerland as an au pair until September.

Tony and I met at University in York where he was studying Sociology. Degrees achieved, we went back to our respective corners of the country - me to Midhurst in Sussex, and to spend a year working at Bognor Regis Library; Tony back home to Merseyside, thence to Poulton-le-Fylde College of Education to do his PGCE. We both found jobs in the Brentwood area and got married in 1972. We never intended to stay here this long, but somehow, before you know it ...

My job was with Havering Libraries. I spent a year studying for the Postgraduate Diploma in Library and Information Science at the North London Polytechnic as it was then, and returned to Havering for four years. Four children and nine years later I returned to Havering Libraries as a part-time Cataloguer, and ten years ago I started full-time work with Essex Libraries.

When we want to get away from it all we head north up the A1, either turning left at Scotch Corner and stopping in the Lake District, or carrying straight on until we run out of land and have to take the ferry from Scrabster across the Pentland Firth to Orkney. The following link might give you some idea of what the place is like, but generally we don't encourage other people to visit, as we like having the beaches to ourselves.

Follow this link if you want to read our personal Orkney history