I'm a guitar-playing, Frisbee throwing, film and literature loving science nerd who travels often and would travel more if he could. I've been described as having a very "calming" presence and I suppose that's fair enough, though that's not to say I lack opinions and passions. Those passions include but are not limited to: public education, zone defenses, novels by Nabokov, sushi and sake, The Mars Volta, the health benefits of breastfeeding children, beer, pub trivia, Dachshunds, boardgames, Radiohead, Japanese movies from the 1950s, and being allergic to cats (perhaps not a passion, but whatever).

Traveling. I work for a company hell-bent on A: surviving the recession B: solving the worlds water problems one industrial-sized membrane filter at a time. I spend a lot of my time going out and running tests at locals as exotic as Kazakhstan and Tokyo, or as mundane and dreadful as Bakersfield.

Back in Berkeley I try to write music. There's no goal in mind here--it's mostly just a therapeutic exercise and something I really enjoy. I love sports of all kind and between biking, frisbee, tennis, skiing (cross country and downhill), or whatever other activity can be done on a sunny weekend afternoon, I stay fairly active. If it's raining, I may drink coffee and do a New York Times crossword, watch a baseball game or catch a movie.

Broomball. I wish I would have been born with a more useful natural talent, but no. I'm from Minnesota and my natural talent is running on ice and hitting a round ball with a stick. Thanks evolution!

I will be taller than you. If I'm not...I owe you a beer.

Books: Pale Fire, Catch-22, Gravity's Rainbow, Lolita, Trout Fishing in America, The Wind Up Bird Chronicle, 100 Years of Solitude, Going After Cacciato, The Right Stuff, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's nest. I think I need to start reading more books written during my lifetime. Suggestions welcome.

Movies: Taxi Driver, Fiddler on the Roof, Fight Club, The Nightmare Before Christmas, The Third Man, Jules and Jim, The 5th Element, The Right Stuff, anything by Bergman, Ozu, Tarkovsky, Antonioni.

Music: Radiohead, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, Stan Rogers, Pearl Jam, The Mars Volta, The Shins, Sufjan Stevens, Elliot Smith, Interpol, Silversun Pickups, Wolf Parade, Bon Iver, Nathan, Tapes n Tapes...Once upon a time I played violin and still love classical music.

Food: Not much I don't like, and certainly one of the best parts about traveling (though the more I travel within the US the more I appreciate Bay Area cuisine). I can eat sushi for days.

Passport
Cleats
Guitar
A deliciously hoppy IPA
a 7/8" wrench
sardonic wit, in all its forms

where to get the best sushi in the east bay.

what the best movie of the 90's was.

why I can't remember that tune I came up with in the airplane a few hours ago.

how to respond if asked "What are you thinking about?"

Well, if I'm not stuck in a hotel room in bumblefuck nowhere West Virginia, I'm probably reveling in the unmitigated joy that comes from being home with friends and beer that doesn't end in "light."

I get a bit teary-eyed whenever I watch Fiddler on the Roof (which is often) or whenever I see a dachshund. Feel free to ask me about that sometime.

Sunday night trivia sounds interesting...you have great taste in music and want to show it off to somebody...you need to develop your forehand or learn how to play b minor on guitar...you're itchin' to get a beat-down at Scrabble...you make a mean cobbler...or you just want to grab a beer and discuss the kinds of things that warrant discussing.