ABOUT ME

I started life in the great Pacific Northwest (Bainbridge Island, to be exact, just a ferry ride from Seattle), and after nine years in New York City, I now live in Koreatown, Los Angeles.

Anyway, I am, by various degrees, a filmmaker, writer, photographer, musician, actor, and, I like to think, above all a traveler, an observer of culture, history, blah blah blah. All a big way of saying that I'm not settled yet like I probably oughta be if I had any sense. I spend my days cutting feature films at a movie studio (the same one where they shot It Happened One Night long ago, and How to Get Away with Murder at present), and my spare time trying to finish screenplays and plotting new roadtrips that may or may not have even a whisker of a hope of happening. When earning one's bread, where does one find the time?

PHILOSOPHY

Some very silly people have said that you should find what you're looking for and then stop. I've never really believed that.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

I'm excited to meet new folks in new places, and very grateful for their hospitality. One never knows what people will have to share with you about where they live. For example: one time I stayed with a couple in New Orleans. The husband happened to be a curator at the National WWII Museum, and I and my girlfriend found ourselves poking around the artifact storage there, examining clothing, weapons, equipment, and other physical bits of history that the general public would never get a chance to see (simply because there wasn't room to display it all in the museum). That experience certainly wouldn't have happened if I'd stayed at a Motel 6 :)

Interests

Photography, travel, walking for miles through new neighborhoods (have been known to go for up to ten miles at a stretch) languages, film (making and viewing), writing, reading, directing, singing, guitar, music, swing dance, hiking, camping, riding bikes, abandoned places, photo editing (this is actually really fun for me), acting, improv, acting nonchalant when celebrities appear in front of me, scribbling to-do lists, sipping espresso in small places neither the tourists nor the culture mavens have yet discovered, Wikipedia deep dives...the list goes on.

• culture
• writing
• books
• singing
• photography
• acting
• dancing
• environment
• walking
• politics
• reading
• tv
• traveling
• music
• guitar
• hiking
• camping
• history
• journalism
• languages
• filmmaking
• film

Music, Movies, and Books

The ever-rotating top 10 films: Raiders of the Lost Ark, Rushmore, The Great Escape, Lawrence of Arabia, Amelie, Singin' In The Rain, Lord of the Rings, Hot Fuzz, The Plague Dogs, Life of Brian.

Favorite musicians include but are not limited to: Radiohead, Supergrass, David Bowie, Aimee Mann, Sufjan Stevens, Vintage Trouble, synthwave channels on Youtube, dark ambient noise.

Favorite authors include but are not limited to: David Foster Wallace, Tolkien, Shakespeare, George Orwell, E.M. Forster, Douglas Adams, Umberto Eco, W. Somerset Maugham, P.G. Wodehouse, Bill Watterson, Don Rosa, Neal Stephenson, Dan Simmons

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Hm. I had cancer once, but got over it.

Teach, Learn, Share

I can jam with you on guitar; teach you film history and technique; teach you how to swing dance (I once placed fourth in a national competition!); converse in broken French...

What I Can Share with Hosts

I have a pretty kickass bean soup recipe that'll feed the house for days.

Countries I’ve Visited

Algeria, Belgium, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Palestine, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, Viet Nam, Western Sahara

Countries I’ve Lived In

United States