*Look, I know we were supposed to go out tonight but I had to floss my cat.*
I am a survivor. I have managed to survive for more than forty years in an area where almost nothing grows, where there's nothing to eat, nothing to drink and where all the other life forms are hostile (Paris, although I could probably have done it in any other city). Most other inhabitants look edible so I'm confident for the future.

Also I'm proud to say that I haven't contributed in any way (that I know at least) to the current overpopulation problem, although I'm somewhat ashamed to admit I did nothing to alleviate it, even though I'm an atheist and a cook, both of which would have given me plenty of occasions.

I have been a barman, a heater salesman, a big iron programmer, a military student officer (kicked out, complicated story), a Unix sysadmin, a TV cameraman and film/ad first assistant/production manager, a tech journalist, among other things... And now I'm an OkC lurker who ponders the meaning(s) of life through the site's questionnaires (which have led me to believe that life on this planet is actually extinct and that is left is the okc bot, which is actually quite hot according to its pics).

I have learned to speak English by reading Mc Donalds wrappers and have so far convinced all the people I've talked to that my accent was from New Zealand (or South Africa whenever I met people from New Zealand). If you are from one of those countries I'm very sorry about that. And if you're from the US, "please recycle your wrapper in a nearby trash container".

Since everybody has to say something about it, I probably have to specify that I (finally) saw (half a dozen episodes of) "Big Bang Theory". As a science geek, I thought it was quite a sad sight (as in let's use big words we can't understand and put socially inept people in a sitcom with a laugh track at inopportune moments). The credits were quite good though.
Compare it to "IT World" which actually got it right (oops, we've got somebody on the payroll who knows wtf he's talking about... but didn't last... obviously, good show on TV ? haha). Or for generic scientific geekery "Real Genius" (which probably bombed at the box office and may be a textbook example of the long tail -see long tail).

Also, I'm adding this as an experiment. but I'm a happy highly functional autistic person. Which means I don't socialize well. Which also means I *cannot* (which means I *really* cannot, for I have tried many times) express feelings, they are just foreign to me. This is a condition that is getting more exposed so I expect that I'll get less shunned for exposing myself.

Few people have figured it out for themselves though.

Basically same as you. I'm trying to stay entertained until I die.

When I was a kid I wanted to grow up to be a dictionary writer (or a dinosaur, or a dinosaur dictionary writer, until I counted dinosaur fingers and experimented with pen holding, at which point I experimented with pen holding while taking dinosaur arm length into account, so in the end I figured I'd be a dinosaur coach, sadly I had to settle for being a plain dinosaur).

Then as I grew up I saw how girls (and boys) spelled, and figured I'd never get popular that way unless I suddenly grew scales and mauled them all (and as my science teacher put it, "hahahaha"). So I rethought my life objectives and decided to be a publicist so I could use their minds to make them buy soap (not as good as sex but still, kind of a success, well, financially at least, which leads to slaves, which leads to drugs, which leads to -fake- happiness, which leads to television, which leads to suicide, which leads to happiness).
I figured that institutionalised lying was after all well established, that the pay was good and that people liked meeting people with money. Even if they had suckered them in buying useless and destructive products they didn't need in exchange for whatever they'd stashed away for their children's education. At least it would be a learning experience. As in "you love your iPad more than you love your children, aren't you a worthless person ? You couldn't afford it but then you couldn't afford anything, really. Why don't you jump under the metro and delay those 5 000 people's workday ? At least you'll save a Chinese person's job." And that's how advertisers live another day.

Unfortunately by the time I grew up I somehow grew a conscience (something I don't recommend) which has burdened me ever since, so I considered becoming a professional murderer instead (after all those 5 000 people never wronged me -at least not together, just one after another).
But my cellar is a bit small -unlike my shovel-, there are apparently a few shady things buried in it (WWII was a messy affair around here), and I didn't have a washing machine at the time.

So I had to turn to every young man's default job.

Despite what you may have heard, it's not really shameful to be a gigolo. And many a mature woman used to have a huge cellar at the time. And this is how I came to be able to lift huge weights with my tongue. Besides, mature women are fairly sexy nowadays. The live ones at least.

Making stuff up.
Like pretty much anything I'll tell you whenever we meet (if you're brave enough). *Or* anything anyone wearing a uniform will tell you about me. Most likely it'll be a friend of mine with a sick sense of humour (no really). Although you probably will have to go with it, because he might go as far as to bring you to some official looking place... I have weird friends. Sorry about that.

I know some have even hacked some official databases. It's been a bit of a bother.

Baking.
Baking is like chemistry. You start with random ingredients. And then you literally build something that has nothing to do with what you started with. It's very technical and very satisfying. Unlike cupcakes, which are basically crap, taste like crap, and look like what they taste like except on LSD.
Or US cakes. Which are *awesome decoration* (which I couldn't do) on top of crappy cake. Except it's all decoration. There's no pastry in it. Apparently it's a completely different approach at the thing, like cupcakes. Which is colour on top of meh.

We European bakers are somewhat puzzled with that approach.

I took lots of courses (like *years*) in order to be decent at cooking / baking. I didn't suspect the depth of it when I started. And then when I was doing it I didn't suspect the depth of it either. And I still don't. And I'm still learning the basics of it (aka French cooking circa 1900, from which all western cooking is derived, it came from Italian cooking circa 1500 for a lot of it too) which is insanely complicated. And upon which we built everything (although with much less butter).

I'm starting to get decent at baking (which amuses me the most), and ok at cooking (but it requires way too many basic ingredients which is sometimes problematic).

I also do photography. I made a living in the film/tv industry for a few years (about 15), but gave it up because dealing with the people there wasn't worth the random pay. I worked in Film, Advertising, TV. As first assistant and production manager,
I was definitely decent at that job but it takes either a
sick mind or a supernatural intellect to successfully deal with those people and I have neither (sadly).
Nowadays I take pictures of animals and places (aka stuff you can't sell).
I tend to avoid people in pictures because they never look right for some reason (unless they're naked and I always forget to pack Mace). Well ok, when they're naked, I can get the focus on some specific part of them, and it works better. But I'm still not good at taking pictures of people.

Also I've always been working in software. First on DOS stuff, then Big Iron, Unix, Linux, finally I've been doing proprietary (as in Windows) to free/FOSS (Linux) software transitions for ages now. Although less now. Because I only like to play with software every now and then. Helping people do it for profit gets frustrating. Managing networks, servers, computing stuff. I even started a company at some point (it even was a big thing locally, meh). Sold it a while back.
Computing, all you get is users. Who wants that ?

Well, let's hear what they have to say :

Hey, you got a fag ?
(random muscular tall guy that sees me smoking outside a pub)
Note : This is not related to anal or oral sex. Even though I sometimes try to wink, this *never* works. So never related to sex. (ok, maybe he masturbated when he gets back home, but as usual I don't get to profit, well, maybe indirectly if there were no girls in the pub "ah, yes, lighter guy, let me feel you up, oooh, how lovely, may I have a taste of that ?" Ahem. Anyway)
Yes I've got a cig, a light, whatever. Now go away. (also I couldn't understand a word of the above, hopefully you are as drunk as I was when I wrote it)

Hey, you got a fag ?
(incredibly cute girl outside a bar)
I was telling her that my cigs came from Ikea (as in were DIY) when her boyfriend (although it appeared to be her owner) came and started trying to head butt me. When police officers happened to pass by, it all ended at the local station.
No charges were pressed because BF head-butted my chest because he was shorter than I was. He was drunk, I was drunk and nobody was in the mood for paperwork. Nevertheless, it got me to think. We're all potentially cretins. Males certainly show it more, but everybody does it.
So as usual, the morale is to look at yourself before you look at others.

"This has to be the most amazing person I've ever met ! He bought me a beer even though I wasn't wearing any make up !"
- Woman, met in a bar. I didn't buy her a beer. She meant another gut 15 years younger with whom she'd spent some time in the bathroom. For some reason we were dressed similarly. Also she slapped me.

"I was very disappointed at his lack of interest in my Star Wars figurine collection, even the first edition Gungan."
- Geek, met in a bar. We didn't fuck. Nobody else in the universe did. Except, *maybe* Greebo*.

"I so fragged his ass. Yo ! looser !"
- Random kid in online game. Age was presumably under 14. Sex life was presumably... autonomous (I guess I can relate to that).

"Come on, people will see us, oh, oh, wait, no, yes, no, ah, I... They'll see us ! Come here ! Closer ! No, no, wait ! Oh, I can't believe we're doing this !"
- An especially gorgeous ex girlfriend. I liked her so much. She's married now :(.
I saw her once and tried to grab some hair to clone her (apparently there's a clinic in Chile). But the pepper spray and especially the steel toed boots derailed my carefully planned scheme... Which leads us to...
"You'll be up in no time"
- Random guy at the hospital.

"That'll be 8,60 €"
- The guy at the grocery shop.

"Let's say he's 5 kg"
- the guy who incinerated my cat a few days ago. He was really weird, but still nice. I still miss my cat friend though (I have two new cats now).

I have many books. People will tell you they have lots. And some of them actually do. But actually, a thousand books take an awful lot of place.
My favourite books change all the time. Whenever I'm done with a book (as in I've coloured all the pictures) I know it's time for the next one.
Also it depends on what crayons I've used at the time.

Regarding movies, well, there's local movies, that I can share. And UK/US movies that I have to enjoy alone (because I'm the only one I know that speaks English around here -please help !-).
You know those evenings where everybody cites Holy Grail (and everybody hates you?)
Well I have the same problem, down to the part were everybody hates me.
Because nobody has the faintest clue WTF I'm talking about.
Ever say "Ni !" and everybody looks at you funny, not because they've heard it a million times, but because they've no idea what you're blabbering about ? Well it gets old really quickly. And don't get me started on anything marginally more exotic. Like "snowballing" from Clerks... (mmmm, snowballing... *sigh*)

Food , I make my own. The only thing I buy pre-made is sandwiches (and bread, and beef, ok, and chickens... oh and girlfriends... wait they're not food.... and you don't really buy them anyway...). I also do pastry. Which around here is a bit different (that's for US people for whom the point of cakes is apparently only decoration -judging from the net posts). We have actual recipes. *Lots of them.* Very few of them have sponge cake. None feature Hello Kitty. (Note of them feature any kind of kittens at all, which is a bit sad when you think of it).

(Also I still laugh at what US people call bread)

My cats (both of them, they replace my cat that died. and that cat, well it's complicated...). Two cats. It's the right number. One cat is lonely. Two cats get along and have fun. It isn't really more work. Think of them when you get a new cat. Instead of one, get two.

A pen ! And someone to write on.
Sorry. Something. Wait. Both.

Or my pocket computer (which happens to also be a phone). I store everything in it (which then gets dispatched on my other computers). I don't use it much as a phone. Maybe I would if I had someone interesting to call. Or not. Might be worth a shot.

And someone. So that I can explore it, to find places to write on (what a convenient excuse). The kisses are just so that I can check that the pen doesn't skip. Is it ok if I taste too ? The acidity of the skin can make a big difference.

And food. Or stuff to make food with. A city ! With supermarkets !

Oh and a submarine ! I've always wanted one of those ! I've found a website that sells great submarines. No, really.

So what was the question again ? Wait, wings ! with rockets !

No sorry. I don't need anything. Just a hotspot and a mailing address. And a PC. And wine. Just put the cases in the submarine.

The future. Not mine, just the future, generally speaking. Which will be *surprise!* (hint: war, disease, famine, death, gloom... nah, not really. Just miserable.)

We had a future with glittering colonies throughout our Solar system, and then possibly further... But we picked the other one. That's fine.
We (may) have a dull future trying to make a living through what will be left of our planet when we'll fight for what's left of it.

It's fine. I hopefully won't be there. Your (for those brave of you to reproduce) children will happily fight one another for resources. Remember to give them whatever proteins you can find (that are free of misc toxins) so that they can carry your genes !

And recipes.
And stuff (for various values of stuff).

behind you. Counting the calories you're intaking so I can screw with your Facebook wall. (Haha, look at all you've eaten I have pictures !) Look at all the "+" on my G+ account ! (oh, right, I don't really use Facebook, no, wait, I meant Google).

Or I would be if I ever bothered to get a Facebook account.

Or maybe I'm just baking a cake that's more awesome than you could even imagine. And then I'll share it with people that aren't you (nah, I'll just eat it).
Ok, Really ? I'm just... Behind you ! On Face Book !

...is something I probably won't admit here. Of course they'll probably never find the bodies (I just bought that awesome ... Anyway...

"Admitable" things would be :
- I'm really the only live person on this web site. I have to hire people to go out with one another so that it doesn't show. Apart from that it's all bots. Ever had a contact reply to one of your messages with "01 00 01 10 00 11 10 01 10 10 01 01 11 10" ? Well, we have been tracking that bug in our "contact bot" for ages.
- I don't have the slightest interest in watching people do sports (unless I know them really well) (and they wear really skimpy clothing)
- I have trouble relating to people and *reading* them. It seems that this isn't a problem for my partners. It's one for me though. This whole "feelings" thing ? Your turtle and I agree that it's bollocks. That's two of us against one of you.
- I have met a few people through this site and they have so far all been marvellous (no, really, even if we didn't follow through).
- I mostly use this website because I find answering the questions amusing (although I've met some interesting peeps (interesting meaning very sexy *and* not asking for cakes) here as a side effect).

You have heard about this whole bees and flowers thing and you're really curious
You want to practice the messaging feature of OKC with someone who is comfortably distant
You're into naughty things (like eating chocolate, or watching other species copulate while hiding in bushes with a guide book and a camera while being eaten alive by insects and speaking in hushed tones)
You'd like to taste my pastry (preferably after helping me bake it)
You want to exchange recipes
You want to, um, I mean, like, if you had, like a... and you'd, you know, and you'd... well, you know ? Then... Would you ? I mean if nobody knew ?
You're curious about the history of Paris and would like a really unusual guide (and you can help carry my books)
You're patient (because I only come here every now and then, although feel free to ask me for my email address if you like)