You might want to know about me if you're going to be reading my website. Not the important stuff, like my favorite color (it’s black, like my dead heart) or my favorite food (anything that can be deep fried, allowed to cool on a bed of paper towels, and then deep fried again [realistically, you only really need one decent artery; the rest are just backups]), or my favorite type of music (anything that simultaneously makes you feel like you are dying and also like you're about to pop from beauty-induced joy), but stupid stuff like my guiding principles and beliefs.

Things That I Hate:

Walking: it takes forever to get anywhere. I’m all about maximizing waking minutes (thus, the debilitating caffeine addiction), so I won’t walk anywhere that isn’t within a three-minute walking distance. Enough, already, with the walking.

The Outdoors: It’s too outdoorsy. I’m proud to say that I was one of the first persons to turn against and then denounce nature. Look, there’s a tree! Who gives? Isn't that bird beautiful? Not really, it’s a bird. The wind, it feels nice, no? Yeah, whatever. Can I go back inside now?

Republicans: They should all be taken outside, lined up, and then given a stern talking to. Very stern.

The Need for Sleep: I hear that the government is working on some dynamite pills that eliminate the need for sleep so that you can be awake for days at a time. I need me some of them pills.

Mortality: It sucks that people die. Death be not proud? Why shouldn't it be proud? Death wins, every time. John Donne must have been one stupid dude.


Things That I Love:

The Sound of the Wind in the Trees: Okay, I do love the wind, but only for the lovely noise that it makes.

The Names of Illegal Drugs: Listen, I've never partaken of any of the illegal substances, and I spent tons of time amongst arty types as both an undergrad and as a grad student, so I probably deserve a medal of some sort. But think about it: drugs have the coolest sounding names. Would anybody smoke weed if it were called marvin?  What if crack were called encephalitis? Or if crystal meth were called fluffy pilow? See, it’s just not that cool.

Flute Solos: Yeah, you heard me. Flute. If it’s in a jazzy/jazzyesque song, then I’m down. There’s a great one on Patato Valdes’s “Luz,” a killer one on DJ Cam's  “Summer in Paris,” and an Eric Dolphy one on a brutal Coltrane Quartet twenty-seven minute take on “My Favorite Things.”

Elvin Jones Drum Solos: He’s doing some crazy stuff. Technically speaking, he’s playing polyrhythms. What does that mean? That it sounds like he’s playing a couple of different rhythms with a couple of different time signatures, all at the same time. I can play drums a little bit (I can keep solid time if I really concentrate, but that’s about it; if I try to get fancy, I can get completely lost), because I desperately wanted (but failed) to rock, and that’s when I learned how brilliant Mr. Jones was. He has to service all these different rhythms while paying attention to and playing with the world’s greatest jazz group ever. He’s my second favorite musician in the world, right behind John Coltrane, which leads us to…

John Coltrane: He just about kills me. His music is so amazing that it’s hard to believe that a human being actually made it. I remember one time saying to the girl that I was rolling with when I first got into Coltrane that it must hurt to have as much soul as he had. When he’s into one of his long solos, you can actually hear a soul (in the most non-religious sense of soul) and a person in the process of becoming. And I just read that there’s a new album out that’s supposed to be brilliant.

There. Now you know.