: About Me

My name is Ian Loft and this is my fourth year with Helium.  (I am the handsome devil on bass guitar in the picture) The Helium experience has been more than I could have imagined with challenges, contests and of course modest rewards for a little thoughtful work. There are no fancy promises, just one simple commitment: "Write your best, write well and you will be rewarded"

The Helium community is about peer encouragement and I love to hear from other writers - please do not hesitate to send a message if you share a common interest or have any questions to ianloft@live.com.au - I will reply as soon as practically possible.

Family: Married for 22 years now and we have two adult children. Our daughter has the voice of an angel (those few times I manage to persuade her to actually sing for us). She is also gifted with unspeakable talent on keyboards, clarinet, flute, violin and drums.  Unfortunately she has now fled the nest - I even tried grounding her permenantly but evidently someone changed the rules and at age 20 grounding becomes invalid - bah humbug!

Our eldest is our son is flat-out holding a tune in a bucket! Oh well, can't win them all! He is certainly clever in many other areas and is slowly but surely getting the hang of some basic guitar playing way to go son! We love them both and are happy they have grown up in a stable home and seem to have turned out OK. (Well let's say "mostly OK").

My second hobby is music playing and tutoring guitar and bass guitar helps fund all the fun little gadgets, speakers, amplifiers and of course more new guitars (never seem to collect enough for some reason!). Fortunately my wife is a fantastic accompaniment on flute so we get to show off as a team and have fun doing what we both love. 

The picture is from band rehearsals for a review - I had the inenviable job of Music Director which amounted to many hours arranging music for instruments, writing up harmonies and generally bossing everyone around in the band.  By the final performance in Sept I was very much 'over it' and looking forward to a few months break before production starts on the 2011 show.  Lots of fun but this also involved working with a lot of children - aaarrrrgggghhhhh!

Favourite TV/Movies:

Poe (from the late and great Eric Woolfson (Second half of the Alan Parsons Projects))

Star Trek

NCIS

Favourite Music:

Easier if I say I cannot stand Punk, Acid Rock, Grunge Rock, Poorly structured Alternative styles or that crappy "house" music you know what I call Doof-Doof. I grew up on a heavy diet of classical and lots of Rock from the 50's & 70's era. My all time favourites are Alan Parsons, Pink Floyd, and the Eagles.

Please feel free to send me your suggestions or observations to ianloft@live.com.au I am always interested in comments and constructive observations - love to hear from you:

Ian Loft

My passion is ...

Music - playing, performing, arranging and writing

I know too much about ...

Getting myself into trouble

My parents always told me ...

I would get into trouble

My childhood ambition ...

To be an astronaut. For some reason, it never worked out.

My favorite memory ...

A picnic with a girlfriend - she sort of stuck around and we married!

Why I write ...

I would explode if I were to bottle it all up.

What I am reading/watching/listening to ...

David Eddings - The Mallorean Series

My first job ...

Electrician

My best moment ...

Winning my current job over fierce competition

My inspiration ...

Jesus

Sciences > Water & Oceanography The tsunami threat for coastal areas

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Tsunamis are much more than freak ocean waves and there are four ways in which a tsunami can result, each with varying degrees of power. What sets a tsunami apart from normal or even giant surf beach waves is their phenomenal wavelength, which is the linear distance from peak to trough. A standard beach wave may exhibit a wave length ranging from a few feet to yards depending on atmospheric conditions, tides, ocean currents and of course the geology of the sea floor close to land. A tsunami can exhibit wavelengths of hundreds of miles and this invariably results in devastation once these w...

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• Marketplace Premier Writer
• Marketplace Approved Writer
• Helium Charter Member