Looking for that fine line between chaos and order. It exists somewhere, and I am determined to find it.

I'm content but always looking for ways to improve. I've lived in Chicago and London, and came back home to help out my elderly aunt and set up a base of operations in a city where I can afford to live how I want.

I love to travel, have seen a fair amount of Europe and Japan, and spent three months in Zambia, Malawi, and South Africa. Learned to dive in Lake Malawi but I'd need to take a refresher course. Too many people to visit, not enough vacation time ... the upside of most of my friends leaving the city with everyone else.

I am laid back, philosophical, happy with my life and interested in just about everything.

Social work, subcategory: mental health, specifically: support staff in assisted independent living. I'm afraid I've been ruined for 9 to 5 forever. I get paid to hang out wherever we want! We go to the museums and the parks! How could I go back to an office?

Trying to get out to woodsier woods than the city parks, though as city parks go, they're grand.

Reading tons of books, and trying to get that down to a more manageable level ... I go into withdrawal just thinking about it.

And I love my dives, but not every day of the week!

Frittering away the hours that make up the long day, with apologies to Pink Floyd.

Neglecting plants, but always somehow selecting one or two indestructible ones.

Being recession-proof.

Crosswords!

That I am an excellent lounger but still kind of twitchy.

Sushi, Indian, Thai, Ethiopian, pho, Middle Eastern, every kind out there. I'm not the best cook, but I get by.

Books - Franny & Zooey and everything following; Travels With Charley and Sweet Thursday; Name of the Rose; Travels With My Aunt; Razor's Edge; American Gods; Mrs Dalloway; E.M. Forster; Watership Down; Crime and Punishment; my 1940 edition of Brothers Grimm fairy tales; Battle Royale (manga then novel); Hellblazer; Y the Last Man; Sandman; Marvel Civil War; Whedon & Claremont-written X-Men; Watchmen & V for Vendetta ... I will never finish all the books I own, not even if I stop going to the library.

Movies - Blues Brothers, Spirited Away, Royal Tenenbaums, Donnie Darko, Shaun of the Dead, Kung Fu Hustle, Life Aquatic, Hot Fuzz, Serenity, all the 40s black & white classics, Seven Samurai, Shaolin Soccer, Princess Mononoke, Howl's Moving Castle, Ghostbusters, Chicken Run, Wallace & Grommit's Curse of the Wererabbit, Stripes, Pan's Labyrinth ...

Music - Tom Waits, David Bowie, Smiths, Wilco, Uncle Tupelo, the Clash, Neko Case, Michael Franti, Jenny Lewis, Emmylou Harris, Billy Bragg, Kirsty MacColl, Lily Allen, Johnny Cash, Matisyahu, Gram Parsons, the Band, Flaming Lips, Pogues, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin & all the 70s rock gods and 80s punk/new wave I grew up on, big band, some reggae, classical, working on operas (Magic Flute is great, seeing La Boheme this weekend!).

TV - I'm doomed to falling in love with cancelled shows. Firefly, Freaks and Geeks, now Life on Mars. Sigh. Luckily there's Earl, 30 Rock, and second-hand DVD dealers. And Stephen T. Colbert!!! He always makes everything better.

Gallows humor, family and friends, appreciation for the good stuff, pets, the woods, and independence.

What happened when Fu met the Sunflower Samurai and why people steal DVDs from the library.

If my tires are underinflated or are they just making tires differently now.

Why my cats can't just eat the whole damn mouse.

Hanging out and/or playing pool, or doing dinner and a movie, depending on the crowd.

I'll do what I can to prevent the apocalypse, cos I'd be torn between attaching myself to the hunter/survivalists for practicality's sake, at the risk of offending my zombie movie fanatic friends, and the whole thing would get really annoying. And I'd end up wandering off to look for the little old black lady in Nebraska anyway.

You're on a similar wavelength ... have your life mainly together, live in the city, college grads, have travelled, are looking more to hang out. I'm not much of a sports fan and don't hang out in the suburbs, so I'd not be your best choice if you are or do.

If you appreciate goofiness, see things in more than black and white, and think a lot without being all serious about it, then we should chat. Meeting people is a good thing. Or so I've been told.