CURRENT MISSION

Back to school, back to school, so daddy doesn't think that I'm a fool.

ABOUT ME

I am an avid reader, a constant writer, and a lifelong student. I am always searching for that which makes one think or feel beyond experience.

My essays are always flowery, my poetry archaic, my anthropology dense, and my linguistics didactic, yet my fiction always sounds like Hemingway.

I think I'm hilarious but my sister thinks I'm an idiot.

I spend about thirty minutes every day looking for my glasses. I never wear them in the morning, which is the only time I look in the mirror, so my residual self-image probably has me without them.

I've spilled coffee, milk, wine, beer, and several gallons of orange juice on my laptop, yet she still loves me. But the hot cocoa made the down arrow key stick a little.

I'm a compulsive bullshitter, but I really do know a lot of random facts, which makes it hard even for me to sort out the truth and the tiny un-truths.

I'm an avid Midwestern nationalist.

I am a devout Bokononist, doom-dee-dum-dee-do.

PHILOSOPHY

We are all students of life; tell me what you have learned, and I will listen, I will learn.

Arguments are to be avoided, they are always vulgar and often convincing.

So it goes.

Warum ich bei Couchsurfing bin

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I see Couch Surfing as an opportunity to make new friends across the world, in environments where I normally wouldn't.

Interessen

My favorite literary devices are the run-on and ironic understatment.

Doing: reading, writing, hiking, swimming, photography, sailing (some day...)

Learning: literature, philosophy, anthropology, languages (just beginning)

Seeing: art, architecture, castles (!), mountains, coastlines

Enjoying: people-watching, one-match fires, star-gazing, the sound of the restless waves, napping on the grass

• arts
• writing
• literature
• poetry
• architecture
• photography
• wine
• beer
• coffee
• running
• reading
• hiking
• surfing
• sailing
• swimming
• anthropology
• languages
• mountains

Musik, Filme und Bücher

Right now I'm reading "The Brothers Karamazov" and "The Complete Short Stories of Hemingway," just finished "The Physician," "Perfume," "Discipline and Punish," "Imagined Communities," "The Alchemist," and "The Age of American Unreason."

My musical taste is pretty erratic, but I am a huge fan of all heavy metal, from 80's thrash to modern European progressive; also classic rock, especially the obligatory Led Zep, Pink Floyd, and home-town-hero Bob Seger; I've always appreciated classical but I'm just now starting to learn my composers; big-band jazz a la Count Basie; and last, my favorite musician, song-writer and poet, Leonard Cohen, about whom I have an inordinate degree of obsession.

I like movies that can blow me away. "Pride and Prejudice" for its epic cinematography. "Shaun of the Dead" for the pace and the editing. "Fight Club" for its plot. "Pulp Fiction" for its lack of a plot. "Planet Terror" for its sheer audacity. "Star Wars IV,V,VI" "Gladiator" and "Lord of the Rings" for their sheer scale and grandeur. "The Prestige" for it's twists and renewability. "Gran Torino" because it made me homesick.

Eine tolle Erfahrung, die ich gemacht habe

There was this golden-eyed tabby at our campsite outside Toledo and he must have lost a fight or something because there was this scabby wound on his neck that he kept scratching at. It must have gotten in his vocal chords because he couldn't purr and he'd make a strange rasping sound the same as when he breathed, and after I petted him he slept half the night on my sleeping bag under the stars, and the other half with my sister. He was a tramp that golden-eyed tabby, a real tramp.

Lehren, lernen, teilen

I can teach a little bit of something, I'd like to learn a lot of everyting, and I'm willing to share pretty much anything. But for practicality's sake, let's say a game of cards and some beer. And I'm a demon at editing, so if you have something that needs a glancing over, I'll rip it to shreds for you, then tape it back together.

Länder, die ich besucht habe

Chile, France, Ireland, Peru

Länder, in denen ich gelebt habe

Spain, United States