About me

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I was born in Denmark, but have for the many years lived in London. I have an online photo gallery.

My professional interests were initially electronics and software. I started working as a programmer/analyst in 1983, but these days usually work at a higher abstraction level. Interest areas are finance/investment banking, technology, sustainability, renewable energy, energy-efficiency and soft commodities trade supply-chain.

Origins of my first name

Sigurd is an old norse name, with roots in the Icelandic Edda. It has common mythological ancestry with St. George in Anglo-Saxon mythology.

Origins of my family name

My surname is written Høgsbro in Danish, which literally translated means ‘Hawksbridge’. Some of my ancestors spelt the name ‘Høxbroe’. It is also the name of a small town in western Denmark.

When I moved to UK in 1983 I soon found that insisting on the ‘ø’ was not going to make for an easy life, so I quietly dropped it in favour of an ‘o’. Unfortunately the meaning of the name changed somewhat ;-)

Handshakes

I give a firm handshake, which amusingly led one of my friends to point me at the Beowulf saga, which took place at Lejre in Denmark:

Came then to the building
that creature bereft of joys.
When he touched it with his hands
the door gave way at once
though its bands were forged
in fire. Intending evil,
enraged, he swung the door wide,
stood at the building’s mouth.
Quickly the foe moved
across the well-made floor,
in an angry mood–a horrible light,
like fire, in his eyes.
He saw the many warriors in the building,
that band of kinsmen asleep
together, and his spirit laughed:
that monster expected
to rip life from the body of each
one before morning came.
He expected a plentiful meal.
(It was his fate
that he eat no more
of the race of men
after that night. . .)

The mighty one, Beowulf, watched,
waiting to see how that wicked one
would go about starting.
Nor did the wretch delay,
but set about seizing
a sleeping warrior unawares
and bit into his bone locks,
drinking the streams of blood,
then swallowing huge morsels
of flesh. Quickly he ate that man,
even to his hands and feet.

Forward Grendel came,
stepping nearer. Then
he reached for Beowulf.

Beowulf grasped his arm
and sat up. The criminal
knew he had not met
in this middle-earth
another with such a grip.
Grendel’s spirit was afraid
and his heart eager
to get away, to flee
to his hiding place, flee
to the devils he kept
for company. Never had he met
a man such as this.

Beowulf then kept in mind
the speeches he had made
in the evening and stood
upright, firmly grasping
Grendel’s hand until
the fingers broke.

The monster strove to escape.
Beowulf stepped closer. That
famous monster suddenly wanted
to disappear into the fens.
He realized the power of those hands,
the wrathful grip he was in.
Grendel felt sorry
he had made a trip to Herot.

Tagline
The quote is from the movie Highlander, and seemed fitting as I’ve yet to find another person online with same name as me!

Other great lines from that movie are:

  • I have something to say! It’s better burn out, than to fade away!
  • Don’t lose your head

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