[Meme] Baaaaaaaa!!!
Shamelessly ganked from dromeda who asked me the questions.
The Rules:
1. Leave me a comment saying, “interview me.”
2. I will respond by asking you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. Update your LJ with the answers to the questions. (You must do this, even if it's filtered for my eyes only!)
4. Include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.
Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with. Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given.
1. What does your perfect environment look like?
Depends on the context! Clean air and water are a plus, but in terms of personal environment it depends on if I'm working or not. If I'm working I like a desk with room for computer + surfaces on which I can write notes. I like a lot of light as well. For social, I like small groups and activity that all can partake in to one degree or another (heckling is a form of participation). My natural habitat is a small social group engaged in gaming of one form or another.
2. Why raccoons?
Because they're cute, smart, play well with kitties, and my first-ever Changeling: The Dreaming character (who rocked) was a Racoon Pooka who became notorious among those who knew me. At some point people started getting me raccoon stuffies and the collection started. It just sort of stuck. But raccoons are certifiably awesome.
3. Favorite things(s) about Maine and Boston?
Respectively:
Maine - The cost of living. Hands down this is one of the cheapest places I've ever lived, or will likely ever live. It's the benefits of living in the south, without having to live in the south. I also really, really like the snow and climate. I will miss both dearly.
Boston - The social is the big appeal to Boston. Plus the political climate. (Maine has become especially toxic in this regard, of late.) Massachusetts is my home and I like living in my home. I really miss gaming so the social bits are super important to me, now.
4. Do you ever wish you could have made the massage therapist thing work?
Oh god yes. I really miss massage therapy a lot. My plan is to someday have enough space to set up a table in a permenant fashion and do massage as a hobby on the side. Right now I don't really have that kind of space (and my table has suffered for having been stored in a basement that flooded). That said, massage therapy is a small business kind of format and my health situation, plus my life and financial situation, mean I'm no good for that kind of life right now. I need more stability.
5. Is there a country that's really "doing it right"?
I'll be honest, I don't study other countries as much as I study my own, and from what studying I have done, there's no such thing as a country that gets everything right in my opinion. Canada's health insurance system is awesome. I'd like to have as much vacation as Scandinavians. I want to see more disaster management like Japan. But I've always been one to focus on what's in front of me and sort out what to do with it.
Topics:
Height: I has it. It's often quite annoying. It wouldn't be so bad except that I'm a custom size in damn near every dimension and that makes the clothing expensive (which is why 75% of what I own and wear is 4+ years old).
Urban Planning: Oi. I have a master's degree in this. My Master's program has six different concentrations. That's how broad this topic is. I ultimately decided to get out of Urban Planning because I didn't want to spend my life doing site plan reviews, and that's what a lot of planning work is, but the act of planning out an urban space is a very complicated and important process. Unplanned municipalities are almost universally a mess (see also: Boston's street map.)
Monkeys: I had to laugh at this one. I don't actually talk about Monkeys as much as everyone else around me. faerieboots uses the word as an expletive and all-purpose filler, which leads to hilarity sometimes especially since dromeda does this as well, and I've noticed other people starting to pick up on it. I actually don't care for monkeys like I care for raccoons. This makes it somewhat amusing that faerieboots has decided upon "monkey" as a term of endearment for me.
Politics: Both the lowest and highest profession - also just sort of the emergent reality of people dealing with each other. I am a fiscal conservative and a social liberal - which is supposed to mean that I favor a bunch of social programs but don't want to have to pay for them. Actually it means that I temper my American-As-Apple-Pie love of capitalism with an understanding that without social progams to shore up the poor unhealthy, and unlucky, you wind up with the politics of the bomb and the gun - which isn't so much with the good.
Conquest: So, funny thing about me: I'm a pacifist. I think violence is a terrible, terrible thing. But I'm also a wargamer, and find ethics, political philosophy, and the intersection of the two particularly interesting. This means, as many folks know, that I have particular opinions on legitimate warfare. These opinions tend not to be shared by many, especially the 'times when it is okay to conquer an independent people' parts. I am strongly influenced by the Milian Dialogue in this.
The Rules:
1. Leave me a comment saying, “interview me.”
2. I will respond by asking you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. Update your LJ with the answers to the questions. (You must do this, even if it's filtered for my eyes only!)
4. Include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.
Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with. Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given.
1. What does your perfect environment look like?
Depends on the context! Clean air and water are a plus, but in terms of personal environment it depends on if I'm working or not. If I'm working I like a desk with room for computer + surfaces on which I can write notes. I like a lot of light as well. For social, I like small groups and activity that all can partake in to one degree or another (heckling is a form of participation). My natural habitat is a small social group engaged in gaming of one form or another.
2. Why raccoons?
Because they're cute, smart, play well with kitties, and my first-ever Changeling: The Dreaming character (who rocked) was a Racoon Pooka who became notorious among those who knew me. At some point people started getting me raccoon stuffies and the collection started. It just sort of stuck. But raccoons are certifiably awesome.
3. Favorite things(s) about Maine and Boston?
Respectively:
Maine - The cost of living. Hands down this is one of the cheapest places I've ever lived, or will likely ever live. It's the benefits of living in the south, without having to live in the south. I also really, really like the snow and climate. I will miss both dearly.
Boston - The social is the big appeal to Boston. Plus the political climate. (Maine has become especially toxic in this regard, of late.) Massachusetts is my home and I like living in my home. I really miss gaming so the social bits are super important to me, now.
4. Do you ever wish you could have made the massage therapist thing work?
Oh god yes. I really miss massage therapy a lot. My plan is to someday have enough space to set up a table in a permenant fashion and do massage as a hobby on the side. Right now I don't really have that kind of space (and my table has suffered for having been stored in a basement that flooded). That said, massage therapy is a small business kind of format and my health situation, plus my life and financial situation, mean I'm no good for that kind of life right now. I need more stability.
5. Is there a country that's really "doing it right"?
I'll be honest, I don't study other countries as much as I study my own, and from what studying I have done, there's no such thing as a country that gets everything right in my opinion. Canada's health insurance system is awesome. I'd like to have as much vacation as Scandinavians. I want to see more disaster management like Japan. But I've always been one to focus on what's in front of me and sort out what to do with it.
Topics:
Height: I has it. It's often quite annoying. It wouldn't be so bad except that I'm a custom size in damn near every dimension and that makes the clothing expensive (which is why 75% of what I own and wear is 4+ years old).
Urban Planning: Oi. I have a master's degree in this. My Master's program has six different concentrations. That's how broad this topic is. I ultimately decided to get out of Urban Planning because I didn't want to spend my life doing site plan reviews, and that's what a lot of planning work is, but the act of planning out an urban space is a very complicated and important process. Unplanned municipalities are almost universally a mess (see also: Boston's street map.)
Monkeys: I had to laugh at this one. I don't actually talk about Monkeys as much as everyone else around me. faerieboots uses the word as an expletive and all-purpose filler, which leads to hilarity sometimes especially since dromeda does this as well, and I've noticed other people starting to pick up on it. I actually don't care for monkeys like I care for raccoons. This makes it somewhat amusing that faerieboots has decided upon "monkey" as a term of endearment for me.
Politics: Both the lowest and highest profession - also just sort of the emergent reality of people dealing with each other. I am a fiscal conservative and a social liberal - which is supposed to mean that I favor a bunch of social programs but don't want to have to pay for them. Actually it means that I temper my American-As-Apple-Pie love of capitalism with an understanding that without social progams to shore up the poor unhealthy, and unlucky, you wind up with the politics of the bomb and the gun - which isn't so much with the good.
Conquest: So, funny thing about me: I'm a pacifist. I think violence is a terrible, terrible thing. But I'm also a wargamer, and find ethics, political philosophy, and the intersection of the two particularly interesting. This means, as many folks know, that I have particular opinions on legitimate warfare. These opinions tend not to be shared by many, especially the 'times when it is okay to conquer an independent people' parts. I am strongly influenced by the Milian Dialogue in this.