Inside the ACat’s Studio

I honestly have no idea how long ago I last posted the questions meme, or how many of those questions I answered before I disappeared under a rock again, but I saved them all in a file, and after yesterday’s incredible list of random questions, I figured I’d just continue with that theme until i run out. So here’s 25 more questions and answers about me, provided at some indeterminate time in the past by people on my flist.

Questions from radiantbaby :

1) Who is your favorite band/singer?
Wow, that’s actually a really hard question, because my tastes in music are both eclectic and expansive. Even leaving aside people I know personally via the filk community, which could make a decent top 20 or 40 list in itself, it’s hard for me to pick any single favourite.

I have tickets to see Great Big Sea in April, so that’d be a good pick of the moment. I very recently discovered April Smith and the Great Picture Show, which I’ve been listening to a lot since her CD arrived in the mail, and I just stumbled across a country singer named Josh Thompson who I’m really digging. (Which is more a matter of what music I’ve been listening to recently that it is an indication of what my favourites are).

I’ve recently started trying to get back into the habit of regularly practising my guitar playing, and that’s led me to playing songs by Cheryl Wheeler, Robin Batteau, Dar Williams, Tanya Savory, Paul Simon, Dougie Maclean, Talis Kimberly, Anne Hills, Ben Wakeman, and Richard Shindell; what these artists all have in common is that I liked at least one of their songs well enough to learn to play it from memory, without having to consult a lead sheet. (And which makes them ideal practice songs, since I can just pick up the guitar and play.)

2) If you could go back in time, what year would you visit? Why?
Assuming that I am going back strictly as an observer and cannot actually change anything, I’d love to go back to some time in the late 1970s and see Harry Chapin, Steve Goodman, and Stan Rogers in concert. I didn’t really get deeply into any of their music before their deaths, and I’d love the chance to experience their music live.

3) If you were given a million dollars, what would you do with it?
Assuming that was post-tax dollars (in other words, I get to keep it), I would try to find some investment strategy for it that would allow me to generate enough interest/capital gain each year in order to have it replace my income, and then spend my days writing, playing music, and travelling rather than working.

4) If you were imprisoned and were allowed only one book to read, what would you choose and why?
That’s another really hard question. Can I get away with listing the entire Encyclopaedia as one book? No? Hrm.

Again, here I run into the problem of having expansive and eclectic tastes. I enjoy SF and Fantasy, Mystery, Biography, History, Popular Science, Politics, Literature, Travel, Religion, Philosophy, and much more. Picking one book from each *category* would be hard, let alone a single book overall.

5) How would you describe the perfect day for you?
A perfect day has nothing scheduled. All my sweeties are nearby; perhaps it’s at a convention and I’m surrounded by friends. Lots of cuddles, lots of music, and great conversation. That’s a good day.

Questions from joyeuse13 :

1) What’s your middle name (if you have one)?
Taylor. It’s apparently a family name on my father’s side of the family.

2) Are you named (first or middle) for anyone: relative, book/movie character, historical figure, etc.?
According to my mother, no. She liked the sound of it, and didn’t want to name me for my father (Arthur). To be fair, my father didn’t apparently like Arthur much either. He’s gone by his middle name his entire life.

3) Who’s your favorite relative?
My mother. My mother is awesome. And I say that even knowing she doesn’t read this blog. 🙂

4) Why did you start a blog?
Well, the short answer is "It’s all <lj user=telynor>’s fault, since I started my LJ in part because she had one and it looked like fun.

I like to write, and I particularly like to write essays. Over the years, I’d written semi-regular columns for a variety of amateur publications, and a personal blog seemed like a nifty idea. My use of it for actual blog purposes rather than simply self-oriented musing and such has been limited, but that’s ok. I like the community and the comments and the connections. Social media and online community building is something that’s fascinated me long before the current explosion of it with blogs, facebook, twitter, and the like.

5) What should my fifth question be?
Hrm, I dunno. I’ve long ago stopped hoping for an invitation to some sort of naughty indulgence. And so it goes. *blinks innocently*

Questions from born_to_me :

1) What is your favorite Charles De Lint book, and why is it particularly intriguing or relevant to you?
The Little Country. The very first line of the story reads "There were two things Janey Little loved best in the world: music and books, and not necessarily in that order." As the saying goes, it had me at hello. This novel manages to be both sweeping and majestic on one hand, and achingly personal and intimate on the other.

Second place would be the Jack of Kinrowan stories. I really love the characters, and it plays with most of the tropes I really like in good urban fantasy.

2) Please define ‘sapiosexuality’ and explain why it is in your interests.
To put it simply, intelligence is a strong primary attractor for me. Smart people are sexy to me. I mean, you can be drop dead gorgeous and the best lover since the invention of sex, but what are we going to talk about over breakfast?

It recently came to my attention that some people define this word differently, to mean "I’m attracted exclusively to brains" or I’m attracted specifically to geeks", neither of which is in my own context. There certainly are physical attributes that attract me, though they tend to vary and they’re not as easy to define. If you lined all of my sweeties and crushes up next to one another, you’d have a hard time figuring out what my physical "type" was, but you’d find them all devastatingly intelligent.

3) If you could do a five question interview for one of your heroes or deep interests, who would you wish to interview and what would the questions be?
I’d love to be able to sit down with Richard Thompson and just ask him questions about music and songwriting. I don’t know offhand what my specific questions would be, but boy it would be fascinating.

4) Someone has given you a large grant to use in a filk related project. What are some examples of projects you might be interested in?
Well, for one thing, I’d be finally getting around to hiring mysticfig to produce my own album. (He and I have spoken in vague and non-committal terms about this, and it’s something I definitely want to do sometime in the future, but the economy’s downturn put a crimp in a lot of plans, that included).

If I had the time, I’d love to do a regular filk-oriented podcast. That’s an idea that’s been kicking around my head for a while, but it’s one of those potentially time-devouring projects that I have been wary of starting for fear of not following through on it. I may push it forward though.

Of course, I’d love to use it to do some cool things at Gafilk that are not budget-friendly. Gafilk has mostly paid for itself over the years, but that’s because we have a very frugal concom that learned about convention budgeting from a master of the craft. *raises a glass to the late Irv Koch* But if I had a chunk of discretionary funding to do some things that would cost more than our revenues would offset, well, I can dream pretty big.

5) We meet at a convention in the filk room. What is the first song you play, (or request someone to play) with me in mind and why?
Hrm. I’m not sure I know you well enough to associate a specific song to you. I’d ask you what song of mine you’d like to hear, but I’m not sure you know my repertorie well enough, either. If I’m wrong, let me know, and that’s the song I’ll play.

Questions from serenejournal :

1) What’s your earliest good music memory?
When I was 10 years old, my grandfather called my mother and informed her that he was going to remodel the upstairs of his house, and that if she wanted any of her stuff that was stored there, she should come get it. We went over and while she sifted through her stuff, I explored, and I found her record collection. There were probably about sixty or seventy albums and at least as many 45s, all from the early 60s up through about 1970. I asked her if I could have them, and she said yes.

So I went home with this giant stack of records and I listened to them all. A lot. It was my formal introduction to sixties popular music, and when we got an "oldies" format radio station a few years later, I could already sing along to pretty much everything they played.

2) Describe a recent moment of bliss.
Some quiet time alone with my darling sweetmusic_27 in January. At a convention, no less. To be perfectly honest, I have moments of bliss nearly daily, because I live with kitanzi , which means I am blessed beyond measure. But those people I love deeply who are just too far away, and with whom I get to spend all too little time…well, those are exceptionally special times.

3) Who’s your favourite poet, and what’s your favourite poem of theirs? (If you don’t do favorites — I don’t — just answer with one of your preferred ones.)
Like authors and musicians, it would be hard to pick my favourite poem or poet, so I’ll take the "preferred" route.

The first person who comes to mind is my dearest Seanan, who is simultaneously prolific and awesome. One of her poems, Long Distance Love, which she wrote from one of my prompts in her Iron Poet contest, is one that I set to music.

For a poet with a less personal relationship to me, I am inordinately fond of former US poet laureate Billy Collins. He has such a lovely turn of phrase and dry, sardonic sense of humour. I have a tendency to post my favourite of his works, "The Lanyard" every year in honour of Mother’s Day.

4) Record-company executive comes to you and says you have to pick one of the songs you’ve already written to make into a single. Which one, and why?
Love May Yet Survive This Fall is the most personally meaningful to me. I wrote it for kitanzi , but I struggled putting a tune to it, and eventually went looking for someone else to assist. (I’m a much better lyricist than composer). katyhh took my words and brougth them life in such a wonderful way.

After that, I’d love to be able to produce a recording of The Plains of Nebraska that sounds like it does in my head.

5) If you were to say "back home," where would you be talking about?
Home isn’t a place. It’s more of a state of mind. At this point, "home" is wherever kitanzi is, because wherever I go, that’s where I’m always going to return.

Questions from peteralway :

1) What accomplishment are you most proud of?
There’s been a lot of personal accomplishments over the years. But I think the one that means the most to me is co-founding FilkNet with  fleetfootmike back in 1999. That community still means the world to me, and I’m proud of the fact that I helped bring it into existence. I just wish more of the people who don’t come around much any more would come around again.

I am also very proud of the work I’ve done on Gafilk. I’ve been part of that committee in some capacity for over a decade, and every year, when it’s all over, I think back and think "That was magical, and I helped to make it happen."

2) Why filk?
Because it’s one of the few participatory music communities left to us. Playing on a stage is a lot of fun. But playing in a circle is magical. And even if I never picked up my guitar again, I wouldn’t stop showing up, because this is where my friends, my family, my tribe is.

3) Women: Who can figure ’em?
I loved the button I saw not too long ago, which read "Men are from Earth. Women are from Earth. Cope." To be perfectly honest, I understand women as a rule much better than men. The way they think makes far more sense to me, on average.

4) What is your role in running Gafilk.
From 2000-2008, I was the director of programming, and was responsible for setting up the schedule, corresponding with the guests and making sure we were prepared to meet their needs, and then making sure the scheudle ran smoothly at the con.

Somewhere during that period, I became the de facto vice-chairman, in part because bedlamhouse and I where very much of the same thought when it came to how a con should be run, and in part because I spent so much time over at his and ladyat ‘s home, they probably should have charged me rent.

In 2009, which was GaFilk’s 11th year, I became the con chairman when Bill retired from active duty. Which means now I do all the things I listed above, plus make sure everything else is running smoothly and dealing with any issues related to the hotel.

5) What songs do you most like to play?
I like songs that are lyrically interesting and either simple enough for me to play with my limited guitar skills or at least malleable enough to be reduced to an arrangement I can play.