The Rules
- Leave a comment, saying you want to be interviewed.
- I will respond; I’ll ask you five questions.
- You’ll update your website with my five questions, and your five answers.
- You’ll include this explanation.
- You’ll ask other people five questions when they want to be interviewed.
Adam: You find a lamp, with the obligatory genie, and do the whole lamp-rubbing thing. The genie pops out, and offers to eliminate any 3 people from the planet in any way you wish for them to go. Who dies and how?
Me: First a caveat: Ann Coulter recently effectively wished death upon her political enemies. I don't. I merely wish political exile for my political enemies. Military enemies are a different matter.
The first would be Joe, who is not a military enemy, but rather a guy I knew in high school. This is petty in the extreme, but he was the only guy I've ever truly disliked, for the reasons that he stole the girl I wanted (because he had a car) and took the uniform number I wanted on the basketball team. To make matters worse, he rode the pine the whole season. The other two are a little more abstract, and have to do with the radicalization in my foreign policy views since Sept. 11th: Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. I kwow what you're thinking: how cliché. As for how, Joe can be eliminated through exile to another planet, for all I care. For Hussein and bin Laden, a bullet in the head will do.
Adam: Your political views are very specific. How did you come by these views? How do you see them changing in the future?
Me: I grew up being a social democrat, which in American terms probably approaches (but does not touch) Communist. At one point, after reading the Unabomber's Manifesto and listening to Rage Against the Machine—simultaneously—I was quite the radical. Those were a heady two days. Throughout high school, my friend Sarah and I held diametrically opposed views, her being on the rather radical right, and my being on the rather radical left. University changed everything.
Actually, reading The National Post changed everything. I was attracted to the right because of the rhetoric style, and because I didn't know very many wealthy social democrats. Columnists like Andrew Coyne and more lately, writers like Christopher Hitchens, challenged not so much my left-wing views but rather my orthodoxy towards those views. (It's probably a time, I'll grant, for a challenge to the orthodoxy of my right-wing views.) So I was on my way to becoming a full-fledged economic conservative when the "events" of Sept. 11th happened. Like I mentioned in the last answer, it radicalized—to the right—my foreign policy views from a sovereigntist (which is why I opposed intervention, to my later regret, in Kosovo) to an interventionist.
My views will change as I read more arguments like George Soros' for an open society, because as I mentioned earlier, it argues against the status quo, but goes further in arguing for an alternative that doesn't sound wacky.
Adam: This question is the classic: You are heading on a desert island vacation. What reading material, music, etc. do you take with you? When you find out that you will never be leaving this island, what will you *wish* you brought with you?
Me: Ah yes, the Desert Island Question. People usually have five things on their CD list, but I only have three: Radiohead's OK Computer, N.E.R.D.'s In Search Of... (which bumped Bjork's Homogenic off the list), and if I could only have one, it would be DJ Shadow's Endtroducing.... I've listened to that album upwards of 500 times, and still find something new in it. It also changed the way I listen to music: instead of worrying about the melodies, harmonies or lyrics, I simply look for music that has a funky beat that I can bug out to. As for reading material, I'd bring the collected works of Douglas Adams, since he is—which is to say was—a laugh-out-loud funny writer. If they ("they" being the bastards that exiled me to the desert island in the first place; they'll be first against the wall when the revolution comes) let me, I'd bring works from authors I've read only snippets of, but based on those snippets, I know I'd enjoy. P.G. Wodehouse and James Joyce stand out, but I'd make sure I bring a healthy dose of Indian writers writing in the English language. I'd also bring a thick pad of paper with several pens to stave off insanity (or at least benefit from it) by writing my magnum opus.
When I got there, I'd wish I brought the plugin-adapter for my Discman. I always forget it when going on trips.
Adam: When did your journey into geekdom begin? When did you get your first computer? What was your first experience online? How many email addresses have you 'sloughed off' over the years?
Me:. It began with a Sanyo MBC-555, which looked something like this (different monitor, but same keyboard and CPU). It was a text-only computer, with fluorescent green text on a dark green background. That was sometime in the early 90s. It was cool enough, but then we got a 286 and graphics changed everything.
My first online experience was with BBSes, and there were about 5 or 6 in my hometown that offered anything useful. The vast majority were single-line too, so that limited communication possibilities. When they replaced homework as a passtime, my parents stepped in at the right time and limited activity—but not outright, which was awfully nice of them. I played around on the Internet in high school, but never really got into it until university, when the access was free. I've always been "good with computers", but my parents still think that I have the qualifications for jobs which have really intense programming requirements. Computers are a hobby, and will always be just a hobby.
Blogging led to interests in Web design and hacking PHP scripts started in December 2000, which is around the same time I got broadband for the first time. It started out as just being an outlet for getting the stupid personal crap that was repeating in my brain over and over, but I ended up making friends who shared similar interests. I share relatively few interests with my offline friends except for sports, and that I thin they're hilarious and vice versa.
Although I'm pretty confident with Internet "technologies", I decided recently that making a business out of it would take the fun out of it. That's not to say that I won't sometime own my own business or want to work in IT, but the prospect of invoicing clients (and of using terms like "invoicing" and "clients" while keeping a straight face) gives me the willies.
As for the amount of email addresses I've sloughed off, I stopped counting at a dozen. And that was two years ago! I still have my university account from 1996, and it used to be full of spam until I recently realized the awesoma powa of Procmail in tandem with the university's installation of SpamAssassin. (I use it to keep up with my fantasy hockey pool, as well as keep in touch with my dragon boat team. Different email addresses serve different functions.) At some point I'll aggregate the various email addresses into two or three, rather than the half-dozen in use now.
Adam: A series of this or that questions, all of which have an implied 'why' aspect to them. Rich or happy? Clean or dirty? Boxers or briefs? United States or Canada? Beer or wine? Hockey or soccer? Safe or free? (Optional: American flags or abortions?)
Me: Rich and happy. I'll always be Rich, so happiness would be a welcome addition. (Sorry, bad joke.)
I think dirty but act clean. If only it were the other way around, alas.
Boxers. My boys don't need a home.
United States. Nothing wrong with Canada per se, but after 25 years, it's time for a change.
Beer. Although I hear good things about the seductive power of red wine.
I played soccer and thought it was okay. Never played hockey, but I like watching it more. (That's not to disrespect watching soccer: it slowly builds up, and goals and near-goals are tremendously exciting.)
Safe and free. This is Canada, after all.
Abortions for some, miniature American flags for others. But seriously, pro-life/pro-choice reduces abortion to an us-vs.-them debate. The middle ground is that we need to reduce the situations in which the woman has to make the choice.