I was sitting on a park bench late one wintry afternoon and it struck me that I wasn't being too picky for wanting to meet someone with whom to sit and talk, and sometimes not talk, about the faint orange glow at dusk, about the objects and sensations that fall within its light, and the mystery and potential of those that are hidden in its created shadow.

Dostoevsky was right when he said: "Beauty will save the world." Really thrilled about what I'm doing and about where I've been along the way. I think I've arrived at a healthy combination of being serious about my work but also turning it off and being very playful and lighthearted. Major loves - books, jazz, baseball on the radio, common sense, movies...more common sense. And I might as well just admit now that I'm definitely much more analog than digital.

I am grateful for having taken the road less traveled by, for it has allowed me to live in and to travel to places I may never have seen otherwise (Uzbekistan, Russia, Georgia, Nepal, Thailand...). I am currently in a Ph.D. program...I love teaching.

Open to meeting fun, smart people who have good travel stories, love live music, want to create an invincible trivia team, or just like some good talk over a city walk and a drink. I tend to get along best with people who are lively souls, old souls, and creative souls; people who delight in the little things; people who love sharing things (including food!) but who also value a bit of solitude; people who are not obsessed with their (not they're or there) cell phones; people who like to go out and to travel but have done enough of those things that staying in and staying put are fun options, too; people who can occasionally disconnect from and laugh at the frantic pace of contemporary life...

Reading, writing, teaching, thinking, enjoying the absurdity of life...

Writing, parallel parking, giving better directions than the GPS...probably a bunch of other things, but I can't tell you all of my secrets.

I look much younger than I really am.

Books: Crime and Punishment, Brothers Karamazov, Master and Margarita, A Moveable Feast, anything by Hesse, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, Chuck Klosterman...too many...

Movies: Woody Allen films (love the old stuff, but Midnight in Paris was one of his best in a while!), Rushmore, Royal Tenebaums, Kicking and Screaming (the 1995 Noah Baumbach film, not the more recent one with Will Ferrell), Cool Hand Luke, Deliverance, Rear Window, Strangers on a Train, Bad Day at Black Rock, The Seventh Cross, Mirror, The Lives of Others, My Dinner with Andre...too many...

TV: Don't watch much...but thanks to Netflix and the like I've been into Arrested Development, 30 Rock, Party Down...Seinfeld, of course...slightly obsessed with Castle...finally watched The Sopranos. Newsroom and Parks and Rec have been the most recent.

Music: Play drums so I like a lot of rock - Pearl Jam, Stones, The Sea and Cake, Weezer, The Kooks, The Strokes, early Radiohead, Digable Planets, Raphael Saadiq...

Other than that...I love jazz...the old stuff...Miles, Trane, Oscar, Brubeck, Getz...It's just the best.

Why six things? After college, I was in the Peace Corps and didn't usually have running water or electricity. Since then there really isn't much I couldn't do without. That said...A few books (no Kindle), some good movies, some great music, and a notebook/pen and I'm all set. A cold pint or a scotch, some good food, and even better company would be nice, too. I suppose access to a drum set would be ideal. How many is that? 7 or 8? Good thing this isn't The Price Is Right.

D) All of the above

Also...why people don't notice when they've taken up more than one parking space...or why they notice and decide not to fix it before getting out of the car!

"Oh, the usual. I bowl. Drive around. The occasional acid flashback..."

I am pretty sure that Ron Swanson is my personal hero.

any of the above speaks to you in any way.