A guest post - introducing my colleague writer David Prosser

I would like to introduce my colleague writer David Prosser, who has kindly received my invitation to share a post in the blog:

Born in 1951 David Prosser led a perfectly normal life until inheriting a manorial title aged 40. Though he didn't become independently wealthy overnight as he'd hoped, he did find his responsibilities changed and his outlook had to broaden exponentially.

 :David writes

 I worked in Local Government for most of my working life but was forced to retire when ill health took its toll. Now having to spend much of my life indoors and unable to communicate easily with people face to  face, I was able to establish good contacts over the Internet and devoted myself, amongst my other fundraising activities, to raising enough money to build a school on Uganda for the street children. Those orphaned and left with no-one to care for them. (Baron) Cornelius von Berenberg Gossler has given up his life of privilege in Germany to devote to these children with his beautiful Ugandan wife Loy. I was fortunate to be able to bring in enough promises to build the school, dormitories and a clinic outside the village of Loy's tribe.

Other projects took my time also. Not least a friendship site (The Buthidars) to cover the world which would allow friendship to flourish despite differences between people by ignoring the religion that would generally keep them apart. We also had on hand voluntary advisers for people with problems like arranged marriages. Peace in the world is a possibility if there are enough examples shining out, and for the sake of our children we need this.

One day a friend on the net asked me 'how my day had been' and I responded in the form of a diary entry. She liked it and asked for more which I did for about a week. Then she suggested it would make a good book. I was very dubious about that but decided to give it a go by doing a chapter a day as though completing a diary and asking my wife to read them overnight. If I heard laughter coming from her room I knew I was OK. Eventually my first book was born called 'My Barsetshire Diary'. At 60 I was an author!

Two more books have followed since then, one a self indulgent bit of fun in the form of a prequel which has me as a poor man's James Bond.  Such fun to write and it got me some lovely reviews.

More recently I joined Gather.com as an alternative social network to Facebook. I was lucky enough to meet Earl Shugerman who told us all about his move to Israel and offered flying tours around the place with his splendid writing. One thing that especially caught my eye was the story of a town where, though the rest of us see as the warring factions, people actually live together at peace. Haifa is the city of peaceful coexistence. It's heartwarming and leaves me full of hope. Earl has a part to play in all this by letting us know how it will be shared. I hope you enjoy his story as much as I have and will share his new site.