I'm unconventional without much angst, live well without conspicuous wealth and so far have failed to love wisely, but love loving well.

I'm an iconoclast who nevertheless is endlessly fascinated by conventions and social structures. I have no faith or belief in gods, yet love the external manifestations of religion and believe the world would be a poorer place without it.

I'm attracted to novelty and knowledge, not purposefully but just because.

At heart, I'm generous and compassionate but my moral compass is blighted by laziness, so my acts of kindness tend to be impulsive and random.

I forget birthdays but give frequent gifts for reasons that seem important at the time.

My Myers-Briggs type is ENFJ.

I am calm, eclectic, i create, and consume

I try to reconcile creativity with income. I'm lucky in that I can earn a lot of money very quickly. I'm also lucky in that I can find creative projects that seem to drain my bank account very quickly.

I like making films - the last one (a strange little homage to Edgar Allen Poe) was a few years ago, so the urge is building again. I have a script already, so as soon as I've put enough cash aside, I'll start collecting a crew and cast.

I'm interested in making an open film too - put a script online in a wiki, then volunteers to shoot scenes the way they see fit. Collaboratively edit with something like FORscene - http://www.forbidden.co.uk/products/scene/.

I take photos, make movies and paint pictures. I don't know that I'm really good at them, but I feel good doing them.

I'm probably best at being a potter - I can throw very delicate goblets on the wheel. I've been doing that so long it's more relaxing than satisfying now though.

I make them feel comfortable. Nah, who am I kidding? It's normally the paint smeared on my face, the uncombed or absent-mindedly tousled hair, the solder smoldering through my shirt, the one prominently-placed-but-not-visible-to myself embarrassment that so often blights my appearances in public. I'm getting better though, and I'm trying to discipline myself into using a mirror EVERY time.

I'm a devourer of books, and it'd be hard to pick a winner, but I'm drawn back to Thomas Pynchon, Albert Camus and Umberto Eco. Peter Carey's early stuff'd be up there too. Oh, and Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams and Tom Sharpe, of course.

Movies? well, I'm a sucker for the classics - Casablanca's definitely in there, along with Dr Strangelove and Brazil. I like Jim Jarmusch movies too, for some reason, and Wim Wenders is calming, while Werner Herzog exerts the same fascination as watching building demolitions. Fitzcarraldo anyone?

Music's too tough to pick. I'll listen to, and enjoy, everything from streetpunk to baroque.

Food's the same. I'm a keen cook, and love to try different styles and cultures. If pressed, I'd go with fresh fruit as a favorite (yeah, I know that's a cheat, but fresh fruit, with some sharp cheese on the side's as good as it gets).

There's not a lot I couldn't abandon if I had to. I'm capable of being self-contained.

I have just started roasting my own coffee beans though, so you might get a hint there of the addiction I'm fondest of.

Umm, now that I look around, a fair proportion of my entertainment room floorspace is occupied by various wine vintages, and most walls have bookshelves attached. There's a substantial collection of geek toys too, now I think about it. Cameras, video, microphones, mixers PDAs computers, phones...

Maybe I need to rethink this a bit.

Tetsugen, a devotee of Zen in Japan, decided to publish the sutras, which at that time were available only in Chinese. The books were to be printed with wood blocks in an edition of seven thousand copies, a tremendous undertaking.

Tetsugen began by traveling and collecting donations for this purpose. A few sympathizers would give him a hundred pieces of gold, but most of the time he received only small coins. He thanked each donor with equal gratitude. After ten years Tetsugen had enough money to begin his task.

It happened that at that time the Uji Rive overflowed. Famine followed. Tetsugen took the funds he had collected for the books and spent them to save others from starvation. Then he began again his work of collecting.

Several years afterwards an epidemic spread over the country. Tetsugen again gave away what he had collected, to help his people. For a third time he started his work, and after twenty years his wish was fulfilled. The printing blocks which produced the first edition of sutras can be seen today in the Obaku monastery in Kyoto.

The Japanese tell their children that Tetsugen made three sets of sutras, and that the first two invisible sets surpass even the last.

There ain't no such thing as a typical Friday night.

I'm really shy and just pretend to be confident. Or is it the other way around? I can never remember.

Ah c'mon, if you've read this far, just message me for the hell of it.