I've lived in Austin most of my life, long enough to have seen amazing changes, and to have participated in some of them. I still hew to those values: I'm open-minded and modern; I presume the Dark Ages weren't all that great to begin with, so I don't share the current enthusiasm for returning to them.

I appreciate the beauty of life more, I like to "stop and smell the roses," as they say.

Using computers to automate routine, repetitive tasks (an unexpected talent!) Oh, and Trivial Pursuits. I'm freaking death at Trivial Pursuits... I'll also be taking your Scrabble lunch money. Chess? En garde!

Not sure... the long hair, maybe? I suppose I should mention, though it may seem vain, that I really do look a lot younger than I am. I mean, like, a lot younger. I've had to get used to looks of near-heart-attack shock when someone learns my true age.

And it isn't just a look. Though I was a great one for partying when I was younger, I've also always been interested in health and nutrition. I've been a vegetarian for many years, and was an avid exerciser. I do a half-hour of yoga in the morning now instead of the exercise, but the results far exceed the few minutes I'm putting into it. I've just been amazed. I'm really a sixty-something-year-old man in a forty-something-year-old man's body. But since so many ladies simply write you off as soon as they see your age, I'm not sure if I've been given a blessing or a curse.

I try to read a bit every day, but I wouldn't describe myself as particularly literary. I generally prefer non-fiction, or older, classic novels. It's actually very interesting to read now the great novels everyone else polished off in high school. Speaking of classics, here's an interesting idea: everyone has read "Jane Eyre", but I think that Charlotte Bronte's later novel, "Villette", was even better. Is this possible? Discuss.

Recently I read "The Swerve", which I found very interesting. People thousands of years ago coming up with ideas that sound weirdly like the concepts that physicists are pondering today! Now, I ain't no physicist, but there have been some good books for everyday readers in recent years about string theory, quantum mechanics, etc., and I chanced to read one right before I read "The Swerve." Seriously mind-blowing!

I love movies. I couldn't name my Top Ten, or even my Top Hundred. In recent years I've been thinking that artsy directors like Godard get too much credit, but popular directors like Hitchcock get too little. Discuss.

I don't find many highly-praised movies to be all that. I thought "Melancholia" was dreadful, for example. I could recommend a charming 2009 French film, released over here as "Queen to Play." It's like Rocky. As a chick. Who plays chess.

I don't try to keep up with modern music much. The last really great album I ran across was "The Prisoner's Song" by Muzsikas, a modern Hungarian folk group.

Heh, everybody seems as perplexed by this question as me. Computers, the Internet, coffee, beer, sweetness and light (hey, cut me some slack, I'm struggling to make six things!)

How they get those wooden ship replicas inside those bottles...

Tapping at my keyboard, filling out OKCupid forms. I don't go out much any more, though I have nothing against it on principle. When going out is once again more fun than staying in, I'll go out again.

I read "The Da Vinci Code". I feel so ashamed. I only did it because everyone else was doing it. Please don't tell my friends, they all think I'm a respectable piano player in a whorehouse.

You're a nice person, and you might like to chat with another nice person over a cup of coffee or a beer.