I'm no good at categories.

During the 2008 election season everyone wants to know whether you're a Democrat or a Republican, but I'm registered Green Party and devoted time this year to campaigning for a local Working Families Party candidate. (When I wasn't canvassing for Barack Obama. Because, OBAMA.)

I'm genderqueer, which -- for me -- means I take issue with the very question M/F? and have problems with "gay, straight or bi" too because there are more than two genders of people I find attractive.

And I'm mixed-race, though as many people just take me for white as guess I'm something completely different, and almost no one figures out I'm actually Metis (it's happened twice, which is the same number of times I've been asked if I'm Egyptian).

Religion? I'm a Pagan Catholic Unitarian Universalist with Buddhist tendencies who grew up atheist, and the church I've attended most regularly in the last five years is Episcopalian, but most of the time I exercise my spirituality outside of group settings.

And pretty much all the usual labels fail to fit me, too. I am a feminist -- there, that's one label that doesn't fit me like a glove on an octopus.

Och, vindt ik dit moielijk. Ik woonde 2 jaar in Leiden, Zuid-Holland, maar dat was 1994 en 1995! Ik heb sinds weinig kans op mijn nederlands te oefenen gehad. Waarschijnlijk is die vreselijk, of misschien steeks kindelijk. Zo veel vergeten na zoveel tijd.

Eh, als je wil me kontakten, alsjeblieft het engels gebruiken, of tenminste simpeel woorden.

Verder over me... Ik hou van fietsen (maar kan niet nu) en nederlandsche voedsel zoals stamppot. Ik vind boerenkool stamppot veel lekker en nog soms dat kooken.

I am anal, eccentric, and self-assured

Well, I recently created my very first OkCupid/Quizzy quiz, because I couldn't resist the lure of the Food Quiz Contest prize. You can take my quiz, What Kind of Pizza Eater Are You? by clicking on the title there, and find out who you should (or shouldn't) try to split a pizza with.

Speaking of food and what I'm doing with my life... I'd love to start up a casual club for people in the Waterbury area to go for sushi together, and/or to go to area restaurants in general -- it drives me nuts that some of the few really good restaurants we get around here keep closing, and I figure that if some of us local foodies network with each other, word will get out about new places (the most vulnerable) faster, plus it seems like having a larger number of people would make "voting with our dollars" more effective. (Not that having regulars throwing money around saved Kirin Jade. Yeah, I still miss that place.) You should send me a message if a dinner club (lunch club? sushi club?) sounds good to you -- preferably with "restaurant club" or "sushi" or the like (but please not "eating out" though I'm generally fond of the puns) as a subject.

I've also been considering starting to play RPGs again. I stopped a few years ago due to not knowing enough people in my immediate area to play with (and most of the people I used to play with getting into LARPing at a time when transportation and mobility issues kept me from joining them) but OkCupid seems to be full of active gamers near me! Time to break out my polyhedral dice and find the box with my manuals in it, I guess... So, if you're either in a current campaign or looking to join one, and in or willing to come to Waterbury for gaming, you should send me a message, preferably with "D&D" or "RPGs" or "Gaming" or something as a subject. I have access to a fairly sweet and centrally located space ideal for a gaming-sized group, without anyone having to huddle in a dank basement (atmosphere is all well and good, but I have trouble concentrating when my bones ache) or drag all the kitchen chairs into the living room.

Experimental cooking, according to this test. I'm also good at finding great restaurants so I don't always have to cook. And not everything I cook (or eat) is exotic or experimental; as I type this I've got a pot full of grass-grazed beef stew with vegetables and barley on the stove, which is just like beef barley stew out of a can only it's better for me and better-tasting too. I am not, however, any good at cooking for a living in the food service industry, being more of a slow food and food as art (where the palate is appealed to at least as much as the other senses, not where presentation trumps flavour) person.

Doing character voices and impressions, with or without accents, is among my more successful means of making other people laugh. (I've thought about trying to break into voice acting.) I'm better at making puns than other people necessarily appreciate, since I lack sufficient shame to keep my puns to myself.

I'm also good enough at writing (fiction, non-fiction and poetry) and graphic design to have been paid for doing both. And I enjoy both... I can't think of anything I'm good at that I don't enjoy, actually, which makes this section feel kind of like just another variation on things-I-like. I wouldn't want to do all the things I'm good at for money, though.

Astute readers may have noticed I can write in Commonwealth English (British English). I can write in American English just fine, too. I'm something of a grammar Nazi but usually good at not annoying people with it. I've earned a living with my English skills other than writing, too, both editing and doing English tutoring including teaching ESL students.

I'm good at keeping houseplants alive... though only about half the time. I did work in a greenhouse once -- no, I didn't move on from that job because I killed any plants. I also have a knack for identifying plants, especially edible wild plants (but not mushrooms) and herbs traditionally used for healing. On a sort-of related note, I can identify many semi-precious stones whether cut and polished or in the rough, and have a modest collection of stones I've found.

I have excellent recall for obscure trivia (including but not limited to nerdy and geeky subjects) which I often wish translated better to more important things like which year I had my gall bladder out or who my teachers were in 7th grade.

I enjoy reading Tarot cards (I have several decks, all non-traditional) and am decent at it, if somewhat rusty at the moment, but dislike giving readings in exchange for money.

I can purr like a cat.

My hip-length dreadlocks, and/or the fact that I get around with a mobility aid (my cane or my wheelchair, depending on what and how I'm doing that day).

I have so many favourites in terms of books, film and music that any attempt to list even the ones I like best would be misleading because of the ones I'd leave out. (I'm working on lists anyway.) I read a lot of short fiction (short stories, novelettes and novellas) either in collections or anthologies or in periodicals like Analog and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. A few of my favourite authors are Isaac Asimov, Greg Bear, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Pat Califia, Orson Scott Card despite his politics, Geoffrey Chaucer, Samuel Delany, Euripides, Neil Gaiman, Khalil Gibran, Joseph Girzone, Joy Harjo, Leyte Jefferson, Michio Kaku, Annette LaPointe, Ursula le Guin, Elliot S! Maggin, George R.R. Martin, Vonda McIntyre, Sarah Monette, Walter Mosley, Dusk Peterson, Tamora Pierce, Spider Robinson, Sophocles, Starhawk, Amy Tan, Alice Walker and Wil Wheaton; a few of my favourite literary classics are The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Hamlet, Heart of Darkness, Moby Dick, Narcissus and Goldmund and Orlando; I'm fascinated by folktales and mythology from cultures around the world and collect them avidly; and I collect children's books, too.

My favourite directors include Tim Burton, the Coen Brothers, Guillermo del Toro, Spike Lee and Hayao Miyazaki, and I couldn't begin to list the actors whose work I like.

There aren't any genres of music I won't listen to, though my favourite genres are folk music, mashups and world fusion.

People often ask me what my favourite food is, and are then befuddled by my answer: Something I've never tried before.

What I'm watching in the 2008 TV season:

[adult swim] (Cartoon Network) especially Robot Chicken and Venture Brothers
assorted specials on LinkTV
Avatar: The Last Airbender (Nickelodeon)
Bad Girls (LOGO)
Criminal Minds (CBS)
Current TV
The Daily Show and The Colbert Report (Comedy Central)
Dexter (Showtime)
Doctor Who (BBCA or, if I must, SciFi)
Life (NBC)
Iron Chef (Food Network for the American version, FLN for the original)
Michio Kaku's 3-hour Sunday primetime block (Discovery Science Channel)
Raising the Bar (TNT)
Sons of Anarchy (F/X)
Torchwood (BBCA or, if I must, SciFi)
Trueblood (HBO)

Thank goodness for DVR and torrents, or I'd never have time to follow all of them, or catch up when I've put off watching for a while.

The above list of course does not include past shows I've followed avidly, highlights from which category include Animaniacs, Babylon 5, Batman: the Animated Series, Batman Beyond, Brimstone (why does Fox always cancel the good shows?), due South, Farscape (the cancellation of which, along with what they did to Earthsea, being why I avoid SciFi channel as a rule), Filmation's Tarzan cartoon, Highlander (it had period costumes, swordfighting, Jim Byrnes, Liz Gracen and Peter Wingfield, OK?), Justice League, L.A. Law, Law & Order (all flavours), Monty Python's Flying Circus, Samurai Jack, Smallville, ST:TOS, ST:TNG, ST:DS9 (oh yes, I'm a Trekkie), Static Shock and The Tick. (I have all but one episode of Static on VHS, and the whole run of the Tick cartoon on DVD, so if you've been hungering for either, feel free to ask.)

Instead of things I think I could never do without, here are some things I used to think I could never do without but have learned to adapt to life without:

- Hiking in the woods. I can still get kind of close to nature, close enough to pick wildflowers and wild berries during the warm months, but no more all-day trailblazing up and down hills.
- Playing drums. My collection of djembes, other drums and assorted skinless percussion instruments hasn't gone entirely to waste, but I have to really pace myself when I can get to drum circles nowadays.
- Bicycling. I biked as my primary means of transportation for six or seven years: here in the valleys and "mountains" of central CT, in Ohio where I went to college, and in the Netherlands (Holland) where I lived for two years. I did my grocery shopping, commuted to work and school, let friends ride on my rear pannier rack... I stopped bicycling regularly before I had to, mostly because that workaholism thing ate up my free time and I couldn't find a job I could commute to by bicycle. There's nothing like the feeling of riding a bicycle -- sure, motorcycles are great, but no substitute for the exercise or the feeling of accomplishment bicycling gave me.
- Driving a car. I didn't even bother getting a licence until after getting my B.A. but I learned to enjoy driving after it became a necessity. Public transit and even pedal power don't offer quite the same independence; I used to drive my Volvo and later my Subaru DL station wagon around back roads on weekend mornings, that being the safest time to pull over and move roadkill off the asphalt, which was something the proper authorities never seem to be able to catch up on and was pretty much thankless, but I've never been one to do volunteer work for the recognition. If driving a car were an option for me now, I'd probably have one converted to run on biodiesel, or maybe a hybrid vehicle. I hate SUVs, though.
- My now-ex, who began to become abusive six years into what had been a wonderful, healthy relationship. (No, I wasn't just overlooking the warning signs all along.) That taught me that while people can change, it's not always for the better.
- Workaholic lifestyle. Maybe the thing I miss least, now that I've finally gotten my head around not working 50+ hours a week, plus an hour commute 5 or 6 days a week. I used to not notice a lot of things, going so fast, that I get to see now. Stopping to smell the roses is underrated.

accessibility, action figures, advances in technology, animation, anthropology, astrophysics, avoiding kidney stones, bonobos, botany, cephalopods, cetaceans, comedy, comic books, cooking, corvids, current events, dining out, disability issues, eating locally, elephants, erotica, exogamy, felines, feminism, the future, gender, genetics, healthcare, history, homeschooling, language, linguistics, my cat, my family, my fiancee, my ficus, my friends, my spirituality, parrots, the personal is political, physics, politics, science fiction, slash, social justice, superheroes, vocabulary, wild foods, writing

On the internet. Most of my going out and socialising happens on other days and/or at other times of day.

Scratching my back the right way will cause me to make a scene more suggestive than Meg Ryan's infamous fake orgasm in When Harry Met Sally -- but despite the noises, back-scratching doesn't actually turn me on.

Something I've said interests you, and you're not a bigot. (Yes, that includes people who don't date outside their race, as well as homophobes, biphobes, transphobes, "make engish are offitial langauge" people, and anyone who thinks disparaging fat people or people with physical or mental disabilities is funny or otherwise acceptable. It also includes you if you think your religious beliefs should dictate my morality or our laws, or if you think feminism is a bad thing.)

You should message (or star or do that "woo" thing to) me especially if, like me, you are curvaceous and are not dieting to try to make yourself skinny. This is not to say the naturally slender are unwelcome.

I'm really and truly extremely unlikely to be interested in you romantically if you're a heterosexual male. I'm not saying that to inspire all you straight guys to convince me that you're the one exception who will prove to me that I'm wrong to write you all off, I'm saying it in hopes that straight men who have no interests whatsoever in common with me will stop contacting me.

That said, if you're interested in forming or joining a tabletop gaming group, or a sushi (or more general restaurant dining) club -- or letting me know about an existing one -- within a reasonable distance from Waterbury, CT, please feel free to contact me, as mentioned above under What I'm Doing With My Life. I socialise with plenty of heterosexual men and women (and homosexual men) and anybody who shares an interest in those activities is welcome regardless of gender or sexual orientation. Unless you're a douchebag, I mean.