Silver Joinee Varwell

Join Date: October 2003
Silver Date: July 2004
Gold Date: Karmageddon 6
Birthday: 25th July
Where?: Inverness
Website?: A site for the Scottish highlands
==In his own words==
Hello, I'm Joinee Simon Varwell - also known as "Sivar". I lived in Inverness between August 2002 and January 2006 - "the spiritual home of Join Me" as I (and not many others!) like to call it. This is because Gareth Saunders, the first ever joinee clergyman, lived in Inverness when Danny visited him, and you can read about that in the Join Me book.
Although I officially joined Join Me post-book, I actually first heard about it through Danny's website (which I had found after reading "Are You Dave Gorman?") back in the very early days. At this stage, Join Me was still a bit abstract, and hadn't seemingly developed its purpose of random acts of kindness, and so I didn't join because frankly it seemed weird!
Sorry Danny!
Anyway, as soon as the book came out and I realised what it was all about, I joined straight away. Just a few months later, in February 2004, I went to my first meet - the Valentine's meet in Edinburgh - after chatting to a few joinees on the forum and in the MSN chatroom. That was fun as there were around 20 of us, and I met Gareth Saunders, which was especially nice, as I had discovered one random night in the chatroom that his wife's dad knows my dad and I had met Jane on at least one occasion! Small world, eh?
That June I went to Join Me June and met dozens and dozens of joinees and had a great time. I met a lot more joinees I had only spoken to online, many of whom I simply don't remember meeting because I was exhausted after having got up at 5am to fly down to London. I met The Leader, and also got christened "Sivar" by Silver Joinee Kes - to differentiate me from the other Simons in Join Me, such as Si Brake, creator of this wiki. My next English meet was GGF2 in Nottingham, which was great fun.
It has been a bit isolating being a joinee up in Inverness, the spritual home of Join Me, but I really enjoyed organising the first ever JOINverness Pilgrimage in July 2004 - over 40 joinees from right across the UK (and even one or two beyond) came to Inverness and shouted "KNOB!" in the cathedral. The second Pilgrimage was in August 2005. A small but growing number of joinees now exists in Inverness and across the highlands - some are my mates, others are joinees who have come out of the woodwork and whom I have enjoyed meeting. You can read more about the most northerly collective in Join Me at http://www.joinme-highlands.tk/, a site I don't update nearly as much as I should.
I am very lucky that I used to travel a lot around the UK for work, so have been able to get to a lot more Glasgow and Edinburgh meets than I otherwise would, and have even been to the Cock (the pub in central London where joinees down there meet on a weekly basis) a number of times. Since February 2006 I have lived in Glasgow.
I've loved Join Me. I've performed some great raoks, had some outstanding fun, and met some wonderful people, many of whom I count as my best friends.
You can visit my website at www.simonvarwell.co.uk.
Click for Photo of Varwell
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