I’m more observant and conscientious (and therefore also more easily overwhelmed) than most people. I'm a glass-is-half-water-half-air kind of person. Maybe you can get to know me by reading about a few things I appreciate:

A poem I like. I've chosen not to try to figure out why.

They say I'm in love—
The rumor is already
In circulation;
Yet when I began to love
There was not a soul who knew.
- Mibu no Tudami
translated by Donald Keene

Funny because it's true:

Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats. - Howard Aiken

Just funny:

TRESPASSERS WILL BE TOAD - Sign on the road to the home of Erasmus the wizard in the game Hero's Quest (later called Quest for Glory).

Nobody knows my reputation. - Coach McGuirk from Home Movies

Interesting and interestingly-written:

The world will someday get me on some ludicrous pretext; I simply await the day that they drag me to some air-conditioned dungeon and leave me there beneath the fluorescent lights and sound-proofed ceiling to pay the price for scorning all that they hold dear within their little latex hearts. - Ignatius in "Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole

When you judge, you ultimately spend equal time, moment for moment, in forgiving. If you don't do it while you are alive, you will do it at another time. - Benala in "Message From Forever" by Marlo Morgan

Seen on a dating site for tools:

Wrench in the works seeks single file.

It's extremely likely that I'll have a college degree by July. Hopefully that will be helpful in my continuing search for employment.

Massage. One of the first friends I made at college had trouble with her back, so she asked for a massage. I'd never given one before, but it turned out I was a natural. I later attended massage school. I never wound up doing it as work, but I'm glad I learned it.

I really don't know what people first notice about me. I never asked. Be ready. I'll be asking you. By the way, would you remind me to ask you? I'll probably forget.

I have a hard time choosing favorites, and I'm pretty easy-to-please when it comes to most things. Also, there's too much diversity in books, movies, music, and food to really pick a favorite or even a few favorites. I read in clumps. There will be a period of months where I'm reading regularly, then a period of months when I'm not. An author whose work I enjoy is Tom Robbins. As for music, I especially enjoy the radio station WFMU (91.1 FM around New York City, or wfmu.org). They are totally listener-supported. There are no commercials or "has been sponsored by" messages. This allows them to play what they want to play, rather than what people who sell commercials think will attract the most listeners. There's a different show every hour or two, and the schedule is different every day of the week, so if you tune in and don't enjoy it, try again at another day or time. I like a variety of cuisine, particularly Indian and Thai.

"Never do without" is too strong a phrase. It's impossible to both honestly and seriously address this topic. I am grateful for my family and friends. Also, since I'm easily bored, I appreciate the wide variety of entertainment that technology provides, including video games--usually the more cerebral ones.

All sorts of things, including thinking about thinking. When I learned that having a large brain requires a lot of energy, greatly influencing the dietary requirements of large-brained creatures such as humans, I found myself wondering if one could offset this dietary requirement through meditation. Perhaps by spending more time doing less thinking, one would be more able to subsist on a life-extending, health-maximizing, (hyphen-reducing?) low-calorie diet.

I often come up with weird ideas and turn my own phrases. Sometimes the results are interesting or funny:

My fingernails are growing too fast. They're really getting out of hand.

When I get dressed, I just put on whatever is easiest to grab from the dresser. I call it "luck of the drawer".

There should be before & after photos in the waiting rooms of psychologists' offices.

That guy sleeps on the job so often, we call him "The Sheriff of Noddingoff."

When we finally do away with all telemarketing, we'll erect a monument called "The Tomb of the Unknown Caller."

For me, it's been the same as any other night for a long time. I'd been working retail for four years before my store closed. When one works retail, what with the weekend hours, Friday night isn't so different from other nights.

There really isn't anything. A friend and I were once discussing how the topic of discussion among a group of people is often the person absent from the group at that time. He pointed out that this was never the case for me, that because I was pretty much an open book, there was nothing to talk about behind my back.

You should message me if you made it this far. It's the last section of the profile. You would have stopped reading by now if you weren't interested. Or was it morbid curiosity? ;p