Ignore the low response rate. I've been a proud Couchsurfer for more than a decade. If you a) take the time to thoughtfully compose your profile, and b) take the time to read my mine, it's very likely I'll accept your CS request, especially if you send it to the right place.

MISSION

Remember others. Be grateful. Communicate. Live now.

ABOUT ME

I'm out-going, but I can also be reclusive. I strive to be a good listener and dependable friend who supports the development and growth of those around him.
I want to continue challenging myself with new goals and to hold myself to high moral and ethical standards, and right actions/behavior everyday.
I want to become better spoken, better educated, wiser, and more widely-traveled.
At various times in my life, I've been a Trekkie, a cowboy, a college hockey player, a librarian, a competitive cyclocross racer, and a freelance radio producer.
I am a work in progress

PHILOSOPHY

I strive to live by my ideals and ethics, which can be boiled down to one rule: treat others as they would have themselves be treated. Some call it the Platinum Rule.
I think we're all damaged in some way. Usually the damage is psychological or emotional rather than physical. One of the goals in a relationship is to try to understand the depth and challenges of the other person's damage and do whatever you can to help them cope with that damage.
I want to maximize the adventure in my life.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I kind of regard CS as a karma-exchange marketplace. I've hosted lots of people, surfed all over the place and started some groups here and there. My CS philosophy: this isn't simply a free hotel. At its best, couchsurfing is like having a friend everywhere you go, and you hang out w/ your friend when you can and share things about yourselves and make deeper connections. Like everything else, it's not always perfect, and sometimes you just need to crash and move on. If that's the case, be cool, considerate and appreciative -- after all, it's a free hotel! Kind of. Not really. Maybe.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I've CSed across the States and in Europe and Africa. In recent years, I've done a lot more hosting than surfing. Always glad to lend a hand to and chat w/ cool people having cool adventures.
While I've not totally hit it off w/ every CSer I'ev met and hosted, nearly every CS experience has been exciting, enlightening, eye-opening, and totally safe (!).

Interests

Hunting, writing, reading, walking, observing, boxing, hiking, backpacking, cooking, farming, thinking, physical fitness, hanging out with my dogs and my habibiti, drinking, eating, talking, exploring people and their interests. What really excites me is other peoples' interests, learning about the intricacies of their hobbies and diversions, or what-have-yous.
Of course, I like to travel. I really like going on long peripatetic peregrinations, wandering around in a city, known or unknown, especially on Sundays.
Isn't it funny how afraid people get of the rain?
I do a lot of people watching, and try to be quiet and observant when I'm in a large crowd.
I'm a bit of a sports nut. I love the outdoors. I love eating and drinking and talking and then eating and drinking and talking some more.
There are so many places to visit, so many colors I'm sure I haven't witnessed, so many stories I haven't lived and haven't heard. I want to hear yours.

• dogs
• chickens
• writing
• ethics
• cooking
• coffee
• baking
• fitness
• drinking
• reading
• traveling
• outdoor activities
• hiking
• backpacking
• hunting
• surfing
• sports
• hockey
• business
• communications
• freelancing
• languages

Music, Movies, and Books

All of the above. I would list David Foster Wallace as my greatest influence. As far as literature goes, the list is very long and variegated: Homer, Thoreau, Dickens, Tolstoy, Nabokov, Melville, Poe, Beckett, Denis Johnson, Cormac McCarthy, John McPhee, John Jeremiah Sullivan, Wendell Berry, etc., etc.
My tastes in music are similarly kaleidoscopic. We listen to A LOT of jazz music in our house. Bluegrass, country, folk, punk, hardcore... Phish, Grateful Dead, Fugazi, Ween, Ghostface Killer, Brahms, Mahler, Mozart, Bach, Wu-Tang Clan, Amadou and Mariam, Lightning Bolt, Ali Farka Toure, Manu Chao, Tom Waits, David Byrne, Brian Eno, Robert Reich, Animal Collective, Broken Social Scene, Murder City Devils, Mogwai, GYBE, Do Make Say Think, Avalanches, Daft Punk, Kanye, JAMES BROWN, Boris, Dan Deacon, dub reggae, Jerry Jeff Walker, Ratatat, Holy Fuck, Corb Lund, Willie Nelson, Keith Jarrett, the Fucking Champs, Mogwai, Fela Kuti, my brother Philip Bombard, Red Garland, Esquivel, Wilco, OOIOO, Ennio Morricone, Toumani Diabate, early George Jones, Man Man, Talking Heads, Prokofiev, Glenn Gould, etc. These days, I listen to a lot of jazz, classical and country, w/ a smattering of hip-hop, electro-ambient-rock stuff, and stuff out of the Bay Area garage scene.
I listen to a lot of public radio (not necessarily NPR), radio documentaries and podcasts
Movies? No 1? Big Lebowski. Saddest Music in the World (and other films by Guy Maddin), White Diamond, Encounters at the End of the World (and other films by Werner Herzog), Good the Bad and the Ugly, Helvetica, 12 Monkeys, Babel, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Cool Hand Luke, In Bruges, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, M, The Red Balloon.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Declined an offer to be a diamond smuggler (mule?) from a Malian man whose business was the buying and selling of blood-diamonds from Sierra Leone and Liberia.
Sitting in the back of a pickup truck crossing the dusty, red Mali/Burkina border, I looked out the back and saw a small boy riding a big, beautiful black horse bareback, pulling a rope at the other end of which was an enormous camel. It was silent, and even the guy with two chickens tied by their feet was quiet for a moment and wasn't hassling the other passengers by thrusting the chickens, all flapping wings and panic, at the pair of cranky French tourists sitting opposite me. The boy rode the horse like he was born on the back of one.

Teach, Learn, Share

I am an accomplished baker of at-home breads. I can make t-shirt designs and street stencils. I can edit your academic or professional papers (perhaps more heavily than you might like, so only ask me to deploy this skill if you're dead serious about improving the syntax, grammar, and structure of your paper). I can cook. I possess an interest in everything under the sun and am willing to listen to any kind of shit you have to unload. I can also write pretty good (poor grammar intended).

Countries I’ve Visited

Burkina Faso, France, Ghana, Italy, Mali, Nicaragua, Spain

Countries I’ve Lived In

Mali, United States

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