Week 71: Mark

Hi everyone. My name is Mark and it's a pure delight to be your person of Leeds for this week. Now although I was actually born, bred and live in Leeds's sister city of Bradford I have a lot of connections with this great city.

Firstly my wife is originally from Leeds and lived there all her life before I snatched her away to live with me and secondly I work every week day in the city centre. I work for a lovely charity in the heart of Leeds called StepChange, we provided fee help and advice to people who are struggling with debt problems. They are a major employer for the city and the Leeds office has over 600 people in it and they are all awesome. I do give debt advise as part of my job so I help people each and every day which is very uplifting. I do work nights and Saturday's those so my tweet might be at slightly strange times.

Of course getting to work involves public transport and I have to get a bus everyday to get me to and from work which takes me near or through Kirkstall, Bramley, Rodley and Caverley everyday.

I am a bit of a geek and enjoy videogames, comic books and strange films. What I adore though is anything to do with horror and especially zombies. In fact I will have attended the 6th Leeds Zombie Film Festival in April having attended the previous 5 so expect that to come up during my stint as well.

I have no specific plans with my week as Person of Leeds but I will try my best to make it as entertaining and engaging as possible.

I hope you all enjoy my ramblings and I look forward to talking to you all!

Week 70: Mel

My name is Mel (male not female). I've lived and worked in leeds most of my life (although I was born in Cyprus). 

I started my working career at La-Tasca  in Leeds, then after many other jobs, I ended up working at The Leeds Dental Institute. In 2010, I started a diploma in adult nursing alt the Leeds General Infirmary, and qualify next year.. YIKES!!!!

On a personal level, I really enjoy going out in Leeds for drinks and food. I present my own radio show at the hospital radio (@cityspundlgi) in leeds. I have been working at real radio too.. I love running. My first race was the Leeds 10k back in 2011, where I came 12th out of 9,000. Since then, I have completed the leeds half marathon and the great north run (I came 764th out of 55,000 there). Just recently started learning karate!!

A weird 'quirky' thing about me... I'm petrified of frogs! - don't ask!!

Week 69: Neil

Hello there.  I'm Neil and I actually don't live in Leeds as I'm currently traitorously living in East Ardsley, Wakefield.  I was born in Dewsbury but soon moved to Kippax where I lived until I was 25, when I moved to Rothwell.  The birth of my first child, Lily, 6 months ago meant us moving to a bigger house.  Lily tends just to sit around and doesn't seem to contribute anything useful to the household.  I'm in the process of trying to work out what good children are if they are not going to lend a hand to my daily life.  I suspect she's extremely lazy.

I'm a primary school teacher at a brilliant school in Belle Isle and have worked with children for most of my adult life as I'm a glutton for punishment.

Outside of work I run a theatre company called Bite Thumb Productions.  We perform regularly at The Carriageworks theatre and have managed to build a small but solid reputation for the last 9 years within Leeds.  We have managed to build a massive deity-like reputation within my own head.  Our next show Up 'n Under 2 will be on next week (17th & 18th).  I'll probably inform you as to how that's going in a thinly veiled attempts at self promotion.

I'll be tweeting about all kinds of nonsense from very subtle plugs for our show, to nauseatingly sweet pictures of my daughter and hopefully some words of wisdom from my pupils at school who feel they have much valuable wisdom to impart to you all.  It'll probably be something to do with Gangnam Style, that's all they seem to witter about from the beginning of the school day till hometime.

Most tweets will probably be misanthropic and self deprecating.  I'm extremely good at waffling in a manner that suggests I know what I'm talking about.

My personal Twitter account is actually my theatre companies so I limit tweet content to discussion/pappy guff about the arts.  It'll be interesting this week to tweet about all the other random drivel that pops into my head.  May I apologise sincerely to you all now.

Week 68: Sharon

Hello, I’m Sharon, I have lived in East Leeds for 12 years and before that I lived and worked in London. 

 

I run my own training and coaching company helping people to be more productive and less stressed by their email inbox and to do list.

Away from work I love music, photography, eating out and the great scenery we have in Yorkshire.  I also have a demanding dog who will no doubt get a mention.  I am going to travel to new places in Leeds and hopefully entertain.  Let's hope for good weather.

Week 67: Ali

My name is Ali and I live in Chapel Allerton with my boyfriend and imaginary dog (hoping this will become a reality one day!). I work in Halifax at Square Chapel Centre for the Arts in the development department. I love where I live and love where I work. Having spent 3 years as a student in Leeds I am now getting to know the 'real' city and am forever acting as a tourist in my own town, constantly on the lookout for new things to see and do. This I what I will focus on during my week as @PeopleofLeeds - finding out more about Leeds and its surroundings, enjoying local businesses and making the most of all things Yorkshire. 

Week 66: Ali

Hi there, I’m Alessandra – or Ali (@Allllliiiii), as that’s less of a mouthful! I live in Oakwood, near the clock, with my lovely fella Robin and also lovely but very naughty kitten Bandit. I’m an adopted Person of Leeds – I was born in Florida, the Sunshine State!

I work at Umpf, a lovely PR and social media agency based on The Calls, and I flipping love my job :) I’m also pretty keen on music and gigs, comedy, cake, anything colourful or sparkly (magpie), travelling, tattoos and BIG hair. You’ll usually find me at some kind of gig in Leeds (punk and ska especially please), probably with a proper cider, gin and juice or a good cuppa tea. I’m going to tweet about what I get up to during the week, and hopefully we can help each other discover some awesome new things in the city! I promise I’ll try and entertain you for the week, and if all else fails then you can have some pictures of the kitten :)

 

Week 65: Hayley

Hi, I'm Hayley Avron,

Firstly, I should state that I am not born and bred in Leeds, but I have been here about 11 years (gulp), having decided that the city has more to offer me than the polite, pantiled streets of Tunbridge Wells, where I grew up.

I play roller derby for Leeds Roller Dolls (@LeedsRollerDoll). It takes up approximately 97% of my waking life and I have quite a few dreams about roller derby, too - especially leading up to bout day. If you don't know much about roller derby, you soon will because I'll be tweeting in the week leading up to our first home bout of the season (against Stockholm), so I will have bout fever!

I spend another 2% of my life working (look, maths has never been a strong point and I'm prone to exaggeration). I'm a writer, I write mainly for music websites & magazines and I currently work from home. Before you ask, yes, I do get dressed every day. OK: MOST days.

Aside from roller derby, music is my biggest passion. I haven't played in a band for a little while but I've made the majority of my friends in Leeds through music, one way or another.

I live in Moortown, total suburbia. 

Mainly, I am hoping I don't get Twitter stage-fright... Tweeter's block. That would be terrible.