I was born on the first day of Spring 23 years ago. Everyday since then, I've managed to wake up. People tend to like me. That's a pretty good thing. I'm 5'8" and maintain a consistent panda shape.

I really enjoy forgetting. When I first come to a place, I notice all the little details. I notice the way the sky looks. The color of white paper. The way people walk. Doorknobs. Everything. Then I get used to the place and I don't notice those things anymore. So only by forgetting can I see the place again as it really is.

According to the Chinese zodiac, I am an ox. People born in the Year of the Ox are patient, speak little, and inspire confidence in others. They tend, however, to be eccentric, and bigoted, and they anger easily. They have fierce tempers and although they speak little, when they do they are quite eloquent. Ox people are mentally and physically alert. Generally easy-going, they can be remarkably stubborn, and they hate to fail or be opposed. They are most compatible with Snake, Rooster, and Rat people.

Here's a list of some things I'd like to accomplish: 1) Get hired by a major publishing corporation,​ 2) Move to Ireland, 3) Write a novel, 4) Found my own business, 5) Backpack across Europe in one summer. In that order. I'd also like to see myself as a Ken doll.

I figure sometime in the next few years, I'll be moving to Ireland. Maybe I'll go to grad school there too. I'll earn a Master's degree in Being a Chap.

I would really to meet some penpals from Europe and some neighbors in the greater Chicagoland area.

God, trees, music, poetry, art, writing, theology, Ireland, chaps, activism, wine, rivers, peace, tea, California, pipes, travel, Guinness, photography,​ coffee, Europe, vegetarianis​m, acoustic guitars, windows, old dusty books, old dusty souls.

I'm a bit of a music snob.  All of my favorites are listed here, though I have an affinity for most anything.

Bob Dylan, Beatles, Talking Heads, Johnny Cash, Peter Gabriel, Paul Simon, Bruce Springsteen,​ Arcade Fire, Wilco, David Bowie, U2, Led Zeppelin, Elvis Costello, Rilo Kiley, Tom Waits, Van Morrison, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Sufjan Stevens, Beck, Pink Floyd, R.E.M., Neko Case, New Pornographer​s, White Stripes, Beach Boys, The Smiths, Steely Dan, Nick Drake, Franz Ferdinand, Belle and Sebastian, Tom Petty, Violent Femmes, The Clash, Over the Rhine, Old Crow Medicine Show, Kanye West, Common, A Tribe Called Quest, Jurassic 5, Smashing Pumpkins, Pearl Jam, Aimee Mann, The Airborne Toxic Event, Al Green, Backyard Tire Fire, Badly Drawn Boy, Andrew Bird, Architecture​ In Helsinki, Arctic Monkeys, Oasis, Athlete, Augie March, Beastie Boys, The Avett Brothers, The Bad Plus, Band of Horses, Beirut, Ben Folds (Five), Beta Band, Stereolab, LCD Soundsystem,​ Black Keys, Blind Boys of Alabama, Blur, Bon Iver, Born Again Floozies, Brett Dennen, Josh Ritter, Brian Eno, Buddy Holly, Cary Brothers, The Zombies, Cat Power, Cat Stevens (Yusuf Islam), The Changes, Chicago, Chris Thile, Nickel Creek, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Coldplay, Colin Hay, Cream, CCR, CSNY, Damien Rice, Danger Mouse, Dave Matthews Band, David Byrne, David Crowder Band, David Gray, Death Cab for Cutie, The Decemberists​, Death In Vegas, Derek Webb, Devotchka, Diego Sandrin, Dolorean, Doug Burr, Doves, Duffy, Eels, ELO, Elliott Smith, Eric Bachmann, Explosions In the Sky, Feist, Fionn Regan, Flaming Lips, Flight of the Conchords, Flogging Molly, The Frames, Frou Frou, early Genesis, Gnarls Barkley, Gogol Bordello, Golden Smog, Gomez, Greg Laswell, Iron & Wine, Jackie Greene, Ryan Adams, Jars of Clay, Jeff Buckley, Jayhawks, Jens Lekman, John Butler Trio, Jon Foreman, Joseph Arthur, The Kinks, Leonard Cohen, The 88, Zwan, Yo La Tengo, Willy Mason, The Who, White Shoes & the Couples Company, Weezer, The Weepies, The Watson Twins, Vetiver, The Velvet Underground,​ Travis, The Thrills, Tim Buckley, Telecast, Supertramp, The Strokes, Stevie Wonder, The Police, Spoon, The Slip, Sinead O'Connor, Sigur Ros, The Shins, Seu Jorge, Rufus Wainwright, Roy Orbison, Ron Sexsmith, Rogue Wave, Regina Spektor, Red House Painters, Ray LaMontagne, Radiohead, Prince, The Polyphonic Spree, Phoenix, The Pernice Brothers, Ollabelle, Okkervill River, Of Montreal, Noah & the Whale, Nina Simone, Ray Charles, Miles Davis, My Morning Jacket, The Mountain Goats, My Brightest Diamond, Mos Def, Mojave 3, Modest Mouse, Mason Jennings, Marvin Gaye, Mark Geary, M. Ward, Lyle Lovett, Lou Reed, Loney Dear

I'm looking at my movie shelf right now, so this should be easy...

American Beauty, Adaptation, Anchorman, Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind, Best In Show, Being John Malkovich, Big Fish, Big Lebowski, Blades of Glory, Blues Brothers, Boondock Saints, Bottle Rocket, Broken Flowers, Cast Away, Crash, Dead Poets Society, The Departed, Dr. Strangelove,​ Eagle Vs. Shark, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Forrest Gump, Gangs of New York, Garden State, Ghostbusters​, High Fidelity, Hot Fuzz, Hotrod, Knocked Up, Life Aquatic, Little Miss Sunshine, Lost In Translation,​ Man On the Moon, The Pianist, O Brother Where Art Thou, Office Space, Philadelphia​, The Prestige, Royal Tenenbaums, Rushmore, Saving Private Ryan, Science of Sleep, Shaun of the Dead, Shopgirl, Sideways, Spinal Tap, Stranger Than Fiction, Superbad, Talladega Nights, Three Amigos, Truman Show, V for Vendetta, Waiting for Guffman, Walk the Line

I don't have television, but I buy DVDs.  Here are the ones I own:

Arrested Development,​ The Office (BBC & American), Monty Python's Flying Circus, How I Met Your Mother, Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Extras, Flight of the Conchords, Everybody Loves Raymond, The Colbert Report, Late Night with Conan O'Brien, 30 Rock.

I was an English major, so there are so many different authors and books that I respect... I'll try to mention a few.

The Bible, Victorian, Modern, and Postmodern are my favorite movements.  I really dig James Joyce, Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, JD Salinger, Chuck Palahniuk, Jack Kerouac, Jack London, Nick Hornby, Dave Eggers, David Sedaris, Donald Miller, CS Lewis, Rob Bell, Brennan Manning, Thomas Merton, Brian McLaren, Watchman Nee, Brian Frazer, Jonathon Franzen, Pete McCarthy, Augusten Burroughs, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Umberto Eco, Haruki Murakami, Christopher Moore, John Updike, Walt Whitman, C.S. Lewis, Yann Martel, Steve Martin, Brennan Manning, Amy Newman, John Steinbeck, Sei Shonagon, Ou-Yang Hsiu, George Orwell, Samuel Johnson, Mark Twain, Robert Louis Stevenson, G.K. Chesterton, Jorge Luis Borges, Lu Hsun, Joan Didion, Carlos Fuentes, Henry David Thoreau, Joe Bonomo, E.B. White, James Baldwin, Adrienne Rich, Scott Russell Sanders, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Charles Bukowski, Billy Collins, Walt Whitman, Henri Nouwen, George Saunders, Francis Schaeffer, Kurt Vonnegut, Benjamin Hoff, Deepak Chopra, Ray Bradbury, Christopher Buckley, Michael Chabon, Gene Edwards, Jonathon Safran Foer.

"Hold to the now, the here, through which all future plunges to the past." -- James Joyce

"I'm not interested in being hip." -- John Lennon

"Let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action."​ -- 1 John 3:18

"I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase."​ -- 1 Corinthians 3:6

"To shake your rump is to be environmenta​lly aware."​ -- David Byrne

"People​ seldom do what they believe in. They do what is convenient, then repent."​ -- Bob Dylan

"I define nothing. Not beauty, not patriotism. I take each thing as it is, without prior rules about what it should be." -- Bob Dylan

"Better​ pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age." -- James Joyce

"Genre is a bookstore problem, not a literary problem."​ -- Rick Moody

"I've got to keep breathing. It'll be my worst business mistake if I don't."​ -- Steve Martin

"Delive​r me from Swedish furniture. Deliver me from clever art. May I never be complete. May I never be content. May I never be perfect."​ -- Chuck Palahniuk

"Everyt​hing I did in my life that was worthwhile I caught hell for." -- Earl Warren

"Apostl​es of freedom are ever idolized when dead, but crucified when alive."​ -- James Connolly

"Pity those who nature abuses; never those who abuse nature."​ -- Richard Brinsley Sheridan

"There are no persons capable of stooping so low as those who desire to rise in the world."​ -- Marguerite Blessington

"In this **** life, you must toss some things. You must toss some things in this **** life." - "The Weatherman"​

"In matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing."​ -- Oscar Wilde

"True friends stab you in the front."​ -- Oscar Wilde

"Anythi​­ng is possible. It is night on planet earth and I'm alive. And someday I'll be dead. Someday I'll just be bones in a box, but right now, I'm not. And anything is possible."​­ -- Jeff, from the movie "Suburbia"​