I'll take a deep breath as I attempt to define myself to the indifferent masses. Somehow, whenever I must fill a square with words, I become cynical and obliterate any chances I may have had of endearing myself to other humans. One would think that I'd perform better in real-life social interaction (because they don't include text boxes) but I still tend to enjoy solitude.

I'm an oddity, but I suspect that most people are, and are just better at hiding it.

Gloomy weather equals bliss. Blue skies equal sunburn.

I love learning about pretty much anything, although I don't think that I'll ever understand sport. Or cars. Or string theory (the list goes on...).

I suffer from delusions of adequacy.

I tend to dress in a style that went out of fashion two hundred years ago, with the exception of a sturdy pair of hiking boots.

I think that soap bubbles are exquisitely beautiful. They make me happy, where chocolate fails.

Well...I'm sure that this little blurb has stated everything that there is to know about me. Or not. Really, if you're interested, messages always make me do happy skips (almost as much as the aforementioned soap bubbles).

I'm over the brackets as of...now. I think.

I'm about to do my honours in English Literature and Classical Civilisations. I'm also starting to study ancient Greek and Latin which, while being sources of infinite interest to me, are unlikely to secure me a well-paying job. I do not think that I care. I may, when I am devouring the corpse of my future spouse because he ate the last morsel of questionably sanitary cheese but at the moment I think that a conversion to cannibalism is worth a degree (and human flesh may be preferable to cheese).

To support my book and music fetishes, I work in department stores, tutor mini-humans, and perform menial office chores.

I suppose, though, that the goal of my life would be self-improvement. I don't mean that in a "Chicken Soup for the (Deranged) Soul" kind of way. I merely believe that reaching one's full potential should be one's highest priority. You are free to disagree with me (and request a retching-bucket, while I wax lyrical about high ideals that I hardly adhere to). Regardless, what I'm doing with my life is trying to learn about new things and, through that, come to know myself better. This doesn't mean that I know a lot. To put things figuratively, I feel as if I'm a poor substitute for Hercules, trying frantically to clean the Augean stables (translation: I'm often in a lot of shit)...

Ask my mother what I'm really good at. Mothers are good at answering those sort of questions. No? Alright, I'll ask her for you...

My mother says that I'm really good at asking stupid questions. She speaks the truth. I tend to ask people things such as "if you were a tree, what would you be?" and "where would you hide if aliens invaded? What about zombies?" Oh...my mother says that that wasn't what she meant.

I'm good at writing...or at least I write a lot, which isn't really the same thing, but we'll pretend it is. I play the violin and the piano. I can imitate a duck being strangled. On most days, I can tell my right hand from my left.

On a more serious note, though, what I'm not good at is eating ice-cream. I have never been able to eat an ice-popsicle without getting it everwhere. By everywhere, I mean my nose, my grandmother's best china and Millais's Ophelia. For this reason, when I refuse ice-cream, you should know that it's out of my noble desire to preserve art, and not because I don't enjoy dessert.

My red hair. For some reason, whenever I meet someone, they usually inform me of this in shocked tones, as if I were unaware of this fact. I don't know if they mean this as a compliment or if they really do think that I'm oblivious, but it's kind of them to remind me.

People also tend to notice my cheerfulness (and complain about it). Apparently it doesn't go well with my clothing. I, however, think that black lipstick is perfectly compatible with a smile, albeit a slightly psychotic one. Non-human things make me happy and so by the time that I actually run into a member of my species, I'm generally in a good mood.

Books

The Fountainhead, Atlas Shrugged, The Virtue of Selfishness, The Romantic Manifesto, We the Living (Ayn Rand)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Identity, Slowness (Milan Kundera)
Kafka on the Shore, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (Haruki Murakami)
number9dream, Ghostwritten, Black Swan Green (David Mitchell)
The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion (J. R. R. Tolkien)
Phantom (Susan Kay)
Lord Jim (Conrad)
Dracula (Bram Stoker)
Middlemarch (George Eliot)
Shantaram (Gregory David Roberts)
White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
Doctor Faustus (Thomas Mann)
The Monk (M. G. Lewis)
Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
...and then most of Oscar Wilde's writings as well as anything by T.S. Eliot, Shakespeare, Ted Hughes, Tennyson, Terry Pratchett, Keats and Pablo Neruda.

Movies

Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, Shakespeare in Love, Waking Life, anything by Tim Burton, Amélie, The Piano, Frida, Stranger than Fiction, Bicentennial Man, The Jacket, Anna and the King, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Crow, The Hours, V for Vendetta, Byron, The Chumscrubber, and Donnie Darko (because giant, demonic, talking bunny rabbits deserve nothing but awe and respect).

Music

Mostly classical, industrial, ethereal, darkwave, some metal...most genres that fit under the umbrella term of "goth".

Specific examples, in no particular order, would include: Diary of Dreams, Faith and the Muse, Sopor Aeturnus & The Ensemble of Shadows, Oomph!, Ophelia's Dream, The Dead Birds, The Cure, The Last Dance, VAST, Marilyn Manson, Apocalyptica, IAMX, Chopin, Beethoven, Berlioz, Fetish, Vivaldi, Grieg, Bach, Diorama, Sleepthief, Amethystium, Bloody Dead and Sexy, London After Midnight, Cindergarden, Crowded House, Delerium, Lacrimosa, Type O Negative, My Dying Bride, Paradise Lost, Rasputina, and Katatonia.

Food

Apples. Especially when they're crispy. I generally don't like apple-flavoured things: they don't really taste like the aforementioned apples. Apple flavoured baby food gets me through the day, though.

As man cannot live on apples alone, I also enjoy sushi, Thai, Indian and Italian meals, and cereal straight from the box. Frosted cornflakes...mmmmm...

They change on a daily basis. Right now: red roses, sarcasm, Murakami, Norse mythology, strawberries...

...

and static electricity! Quite a few of my nights are spent making tiny lightning bolts crackle beneath my fluffy blanket. It tends to induce a bit of a God complex (and quite a lot of maniacal laughter).

How to keep the rats in my ceiling alive but not have them invade my kitchen (it's tragic...my digsmates insist on their eradication).

Philosophy (if Nietzsche, Sartre and Kant were put in a room, who would be the last one standing? You know...that sort of thing - these questions are very important).

What I've just read.

Reasons as to why my remaining in bed and getting that extra half-hour of sleep might actually save humanity (procrastination is acceptable, but it must be justified).

Anything that smells of the 19th century.

Thinking.

People.

Sleep.

Myself. I hope. It's Tuesdays that I go out as my alter-ego...isn't it?

I'm afraid of insects. Irrational, but true. It embarrasses me exceedingly.

I tell bad jokes when I'm nervous. When I start using puns (only the victims of sarcasm consider it to be the lowest form of wit), you know that I'm seconds away from losing consciousness. This would explain most of my profile.

I'm actually a superhero. My powers lie in whimsy and making excellent tea. Oh, and I can shoot laser-beams from my eyes.

...you know who'd emerge alive in a fight between Nietzsche, Sartre and Kant and can justify your answer.

...you don't mind my endless questions. If you enjoy long, odd conversations about books, poetry, ectoplasm, and soap bubbles.

...you can write a letter that isn't a cesspit of spelling errors. I don't judge people by their spelling but...wait...I tell a lie. I do judge people by their spelling. I'm not some elitist spelling dominatrix but sentences such as "u rely suk" do not fill me with the urge to reply. Lynch me.

...you can write more than one sentence. Messages that contain nothing but the word "hi" make for the Internet equivalent of the Awkward Pause.

Other than that, I love receiving mail, despite what I may say about despising humanity. I bite only on request and am actually friendly. Joy.

Editors

• dr_jonno