Hey hey, I'm Mike and I live in the Bedford-Stutyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn . Hobbies include biking, urban (and natural) exploring, film and photography, and consuming unnecessary amounts of art and media. Love reading and chatting about radical, anarchist, queer, and/or generally critical politics. Pretty sure I can converse at a decent length about pretty much any subject other than quantum physics. Basically I like to keep things weird.

I'm a vegetarian, but perpetually intending to initiate a new diet called 'vegan+pizza'.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

I'm always looking to travel to new areas. Meeting cool new people and not having to pay for hotels would be, in theory, a nice part of that process.

More specifically, I've been looking to go on kind of an individual, itinerary-less trip to a smallish city, somewhere out of the Northeast. I've lived in New York and New Jersey my entire life, and most of my vacations with family and general travels have been in this area of the country. For a while now, I've been wanting to venture somewhere a bit different, though not too far away. At the moment, Asheville, North Carolina is at the top of my list.

Interests

• arts
• culture
• photography
• vegetarian
• vegan
• dieting
• politics
• reading
• traveling
• cycling
• camping
• communications
• history
• physics
• tourism

Music, Movies, and Books

Oh boy...

Music-- The Velvet Underground, The Smiths, Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive, David Bowie, Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan, Liz Phair, Patti Smith, Bruce Springsteen........those guys are probably my most listened to, but I genuinely have a very broad interest range. Admittedly geared mostly towards classic indie rock, but some hip hop once in a while, some experimental music, folk and jazz occasionally, even some New Age (yikes)

Movies-- Blue Velvet, Chungking Express, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Network, Breathless, Easy Rider, Mysterious Skin, My Own Private Idaho, Eraserhead....the list goes on...

Books-- White Noise, Last Exit to Brooklyn, A Clockword Orange, On the Road. Plenty of others I can't think of offhand. More generally, some of my favorite writers are Fran Lebowitz, Maggie Nelson, Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, David Wojnarowicz, Sam Shepard....

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

In the summer of 2008 I took part in a biking/camping trip around Nova Scotia. It was pretty awesome.

Teach, Learn, Share

Well I don't mean to brag, but I'd say I know quite a bit about New York City (specifically the boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn); it's streets and neighborhoods, culture, history, etc. Out of town friends who have visited have called me an excellent and informative tour guide, heh.

In general, I find the concept of local culture very interesting.

Countries I’ve Visited

Canada, United Kingdom