kristofer
If you could meet anyone living or dead, which would you prefer?
Living
What do you regard as the smallest number?
i
Where would you like to live?
Eschatologically speaking, I like the here/not here, the already but not yet. Oh wait! Is it too late to change my mind? [You already took your hands off the piece -ed]. I have very fond memories of my friend Silvana's cabin in southern Switzerland. But that's neither here nor there. And there is no waiting. Oh, fuck it: Brooklyn!
Inspiration or exhalation?
the dialectical synthesis: suspiration
Which faults are you most tolerant of?
Lines.
Who are your favorite heroes of fiction?
The untrusted narrator, and the minor characters that innocently get slaughtered by the machinations of the "protagonists." And Dmitri Fyodorovich Karamazov of course.
Who are your favorite characters in the field of chemistry?
Pb (always attracted to mythic potential) Cu (a gorgeous feminine smell and taste)
Your favorite painter?
Bradford Johnson
Your favorite composter?
Well, my friend Philippa has a pretty neat container in her backyard, but it's just starting out, so ask me again in a year or so.
The quality you most admire in a man?
The same qualities I most admire in a woman.
The quality you most admire in a woman?
The same qualities I most admire in a man, viz: Dogged pursuit of honesty enveloped in capacious empathy and patience; a capacity for gratitude; vivacity; spiritual hunger that leads to more imaginative explorations of humanness rather than an attempt to reify an ideal; big tits.
Your favorite virtue?
Courage. It's the one I am most in need of in order to be loving.
Your greatest fear?
Never having enough courage to continue to deal creatively with the accelerating limitations of life.
If you were not a struggling musician, what would you do?
Be a non-struggling musician just itching for the struggle to begin in *that* part of *that* song scratching under the mica rocks.
Pliny the Younger? (yes/no)
"In the meanwhile, the method I have observed towards those who have been denounced to me as Christians is this: I interrogated them whether they were Christians; if they confessed it I repeated the question twice again, adding the threat of capital punishment; if they still persevered, I ordered them to be executed. For whatever the nature of their creed might be, I could at least feel no doubt that contumacy and inflexible obstinacy deserved chastisement. There were others also possessed with the same infatuation, but being citizens of Rome, I directed them to be carried thither." Letter to Emperor Trajan, 112 CE.
Your most marked characteristic?
I make people uncomfortable. I'm also short, fat, bald, and have a poultice constantly applied to my clitoridectomy horribly gone wrong.
Favorite Spice Girl and/or Teletubby and/or pre-Socratic philosopher?
Even though I'm well aware that Sporty and Sugar had the better voices, I guess I've always had a soft spot for Heraclitus.
What do you most value in your friends?
Faithfulness. Bawdiness. Passionate commitment to dig through to the bottom of it all. Wit. Loyalty.
What is your principle defect?
For example: Are you sure you mean principle defect or principal defect?
What is your favorite collar?
The one that frames your face like a madman eating the Emperor.
What is your favorite internal organ?
The Liver.
Birds: terrors of the sky or dinner?
Dinner on an airplane for the exile in my heart.
Who are your heroes in real life?
Sina Najafi, Luke Murphy, Roman Elsener, Philippa Kaye, Leonard Cohen, Bradford Johnson, Thomas Tallis, The prophet Jeremiah, Ruth Allderige, David Dixon, Björk, Jim Goertz, J.S. Bach, Christine Hill, Jim Young, Howard Dean, Benjamin Britten, Jean Philips, Paul Hewson, Søren Kierkegaard, Jimmy Carter, and of course Heather and Yuri.
What are your favorite names?
Qyn, Roland, Mercedes, Baraka, Philippa, Pediatrics, Sophie, Anna van der Vliet, any name with the younger or elder in it, St. Idiot.
What is your favorite speech impediment?
Kindness
What historical figures do you most despise?
General Sherman, Andrew Jackson, Henry Kissinger, Auguste Pinochet, any of the conquistadors, Saddam Hussein, George W. Bush, Osama Bin Laden, Idi Amin... oh the list goes on and on. General rubric for inclusion on this list: People who do not hesitate to send their poor and working classes to slaugther in pursuit of their own status (masked by ideals such as state, religion, "purity", or "honor"), and have the gall to call the continued sacrifices of others "steadfastness" or "conviction." At least war mongerers such as Alexander the Great had the decency to actually ride into combat themselves and risk their own lives together with those of their men. Today, our president sits surrounded by hundreds of bodyguards in absolute luxury in his vacation estate and sends people to die without even allowing their returning caskets to be televised.
What event in military history do you most admire?
Ypres, Christmas 1914. The soldiers on opposing sides set aside their guns, crossed no-mans-land, and shared cigarettes, food, and song. Probably the only moment in European history that the continent deserved the appellation "Christian."
What product or activity or income is not taxed but should be?
Car exhaust fumes. You ruin the air and quality of life for others all around you and don't have to pay for the health costs and lowered productivity that ensues.
How would you like to die?
Inside the belly of a talking Bison, delivering a speech about St. John's britches to the Pantocrator machine.
What is your present state of mind?
Oppressed. Fervent. Want to fix my bike. Want to fix that new song. Want to be a person I'm not ashamed of being. Want to go to Larry Lawrence on Grand Street.
What is your motto and/or slogan?
Tool smoke
Do you understand your rights?
As the PATRIOT act shows, rights seem to be subject to the whims of the state or body that determines to institute them, or take them away. Either you believe in human rights in all times, for all people, in all circumstances, or you don't believe in human rights. I don't trust the language associated with this talk since de facto it seems to be aimed only at legitimating whatever forms of behavior people in power choose to practice at any given moment. Rights language keeps a lot of bureaucrats busy and can make a tyrant like George W. Bush sound like he gives a damn.
What do you love most about being in Morex Optimo?
That we never have a preconception about what we should be making, but that we somehow know what we are doing. But we can only know it as we do it, never in advance. That it feels to me like it's what I've been wanting to do since I was six, singing like a freak on my way home from school, getting beat up. At the risk of Sappy McCoy Pug, I guess I could also say that Heather is a funny and spirited person who is also a fantastic drummer, and Yuri is so sweet, honest, patient, and an enormously talented musician. I am lucky to get to work with them.
