Playful Q & A

Why do you occasionally choose to share rough drafts?

Because the starting point is important, and nothing to be ashamed about. Also, for all its talk about embracing and accepting it, Western culture punishes & hides from failure and the unpolished, uncouth, and unrefined. The entrepreneur who has "made it" is placed on a pedestal and is not only stroked but stroked hard. The business owner who lost everything and became homeless is mostly ignored & forgotten, often mocked. I'm challenging the lies and bullshit. The culture I was born into markets aspiration — "success" & "achievement" — harder than a street corner dealer pushes heroin. Tastemakers can entirely fuck off!

What's your elevator pitch that describes you?

A pitch implies branding, and the question reeks of personal branding. If you want to discuss personal branding tune-in and watch a particularly crappy "reality" TV show pushing conformance Capitalism, and the accompanying myth-building horseshit, airing on network television. I have no pitch; however, I'll share with you a phrase describing me with a certain accuracy: A silhouette reminiscent of SHAW's unreasonable man admiring TWAIN's acerbic wit.

Did you bail on social media (again?)

Yes. On 20-Dec-2022 I decided to take a gap year with the exception of specific social media duties I perform for podcasts & the charity I co-founded with my wife. However, on Marh 1, 2023 I decided to delete my SIXSTRINGcpa account. I may be back in late Dec '23 or not. If so, I don't think I'll return to the SIXSTRINGcpa handle.

​​Why do you occasionally spell words differently?

Short answer: I am playing and having fun.

Long answer: My grandparents wrote and spoke their English words differently than we do in the States. That fact made an impression on me. Also, have you ever listened to William F. Buckley Jr. speak? I once read or heard his voice described as pan-Atlantic. I grooved on that. It made a kind of sense to me, given the peculiar sounds and spellings swirling around my family when I was a boy. Anyway, I decided I'd create my own little mashup and merge aspects of language from both sides of the pond. You know, I am playing and having fun. 

Didn't you once describe yourself as a recovering accountant?

Yes, I did. However, I have fallen off the wagon and am using (capitalism) again because the world I live in forces me to do so to stay alive. And now let me ask YOU some questions: Do you assume I'll hide the delivery mechanisms feeding the junk into my bloodstream—the straws and needles? Believe I'll be a bathroom-stall-hideaway-closet-user like the elite members of the Center-Left Establishment and the privileged members of Media, Technology & Entertainment masquerading their greed and hunger for power? You think I'll engage in similar subterfuge?

Can you provide guidance or assistance with writing query or submission letters?

No, aspiring writers focused on traditional publishing, I can't! Why? Because I have zero experience with such things. I've never pursued traditional publishing. So, I've never written a query letter. Not once. And I'm not ashamed of that, although some so-called "pros" in the leech-filled Land of Letters believe I'm less than—or not serious about the craft—because of it.

What's best in life?

I don't know. Go ask Conan the Barbarian. And if you see that brute, tell him he ruined my petunias his last visit. 

What's your proudest moment?

It's not a moment — and certainly not something I am, like, "proud" of — but I totally fucking dig the fact I've performed at least two jobs Alan Moore has.

​What's the best way to prepare liver & onions?

Don't.

Where do you get your ideas?

Overindulging in sex, drugs & rock-n-roll. I am experiencing writers block right now. What are you up to later?

Assuming an end of the world scenario and all parties mutually agree to a consensual act, would you engage in coitus with a certain famous author that gets under your skin and irritates you to no end and who also likely borrowed both storyline and protagonist elements from other authors and strategically overlooked & did not recognize these influences during their rise to fame?

Honey? Is that you? It's you, right? It has to be because this seems to be a pretty fucking specific question and fact pattern hinting at insider status afforded only to someone who is both intimately familiar with me and who was present when I may have answered a TRUTH OR DARE / WHAT IF? question during a game night session with family and friends during a Kansas winter holiday or while holidaying at a summer camp home in Maine. It's you, honey... right? Yeah? No? Hmm... Okay... then it's some lowly junior-level NSA analyst who drew short and pulled a weekend work shift to tap cellphone mics and was unlucky enough to unlawfully tap mine. What's your name, kid? You're a G&T Language grad, I bet. Am I right? Look here. I am sure you're swell and all but the role you're playing is shit. Nothing patriotic about it. The job is a burning ember lit by a mage flame of paranoia and hegemony. I encourage you to consider other avenues of employment. It's the time of the plague¹. And kids, at least the kids here in my state, are going to have an extended summer. They need fun distractions. Something to reduce the stress. They need ice cream. Consider NOT spying for slack-jaw career politicians and their more furtive shadow government counterparts. Consider peddling ice cream. Cold. Refreshing. Tasty. Ice cream. Folks need cheering up. Again... it's the time of the plague. And your job is shit — in case I wasn't clear earlier. ​

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¹ This was written in early summer 2020, during the COVID pandemic.

​​​What's your favorite James Bond scene?

Oh! That's an easy one. It hasn't been filmed yet. Oscar Wilde plays the part of James Bond. I play the role of Auric Goldfinger. Oscar has just left the shower. He walks to the writing desk—where I am trying to work—and quite rudely grabs the pen from my hand. I look him in the eye and say: "No, Mr. Bond. I expect you to give me the pen and, for a change, you hold my nuts while I write." It's sort of a weird, genre-crossover, double-dip fanfic thing I've been working on. It's going disastrously. Thanks for asking. I bet you're glad you did.