Hello, fair readership. You’ve stumbled upon this website either by sheer whimsy or by deliberate intention. You’ve searched for the “about me” section to find out my deepest, darkest secrets and my overt motivations. I hope to shed some light on at least one of those, but first I must demand your unobstructed attention. Yes, that means minimize your Twitter updates and let your newsfeed grow unattended for a bit.
I graduated from The University of Texas at Austin in May of 2011 with, ostensibly, two complimentary degrees: one in Music (BA, concentration in History and Literature), the other in European Studies (BA). You could perceive this either as a cocktail for unemployment, unsatisfied employment, or for being a double badass.
Fortunately, I’m not unemployed (for now), I don’t hate my current employment duties, and I’m not really that much of a badass. In fact, I’m rather introverted and, if I met you in person, it was probably at a forced social event or you happen to be one of my 5th-degree of separation acquaintances.
I work for a rather large and well-known company and I work with people from a diverse and, frequently, unmanageable region of the world. Please reference the map below:
Yes, that’s a huge chunk of the world.
Keep in mind that I live in Austin, Texas, so this means I’m awake at ungodly hours (I’m pretty sure God is still asleep when I go to work, or he just fell asleep from exhaustion about the time that I start my car.)
This has two major consequences: my social life is more constrained than it used to be and my chances of cabin fever are bolstered at a geometric progression. It also means that my leisure time is not cluttered with things like baby showers, happy hours, and rush hour traffic. When I first started this worst shift known to man, I spent a lot of time being bored, shopping, and withering in front of Facebook (among other such maladies of the post-industrial world.)
Since I’m a fresh-out-of-a-state-college-with-a-liberal-arts-degree peon of the corporate world, my ideas are often treated with about as much respect as an intern whose job it is to pour water over ground beans. Luckily, that’s not what I do, but still: I fear brain rot. I have to keep myself in tip-top shape for when the zombies come around – better to be a delicacy than fast food. To facilitate this, I’ve decided to write things that hopefully require a bit of cogitation and revision. But about what, you may ask?
I like to read and see things (not so much “do” things.) As you could probably ascertain, I’m often attracted to things of cultural and global importance, and I’m going to tell you my opinion(s) about them from an outsider’s perspective. It’s my hope to keep to things current, but my historicist approach to the world forces me to wax lyrically about things from the past. Topics can range from Lady Gaga’s outfit at the Grammy Awards to some new movie to the impending nuclear crisis in Iran. My Meyers-Briggs INTJ personality type inconveniently prevents me from just talking about how glittery and gay these things are, so it is my hope to dissect them and present a rational thesis/antithesis/synthesis of these things. I may not always arrive at a definitive conclusion, because there is not always a right answer. Call me wishy-washy and middle-of-the-road, but an effective decision maker thinks on the margins and understands that his or her position is not necessarily the right one. This is where I want you, the now-engaged reader, to humor me (in the Schopenhauer sense.) I always enjoy lively discussion and I want you to make me lose sleep at night (or, in my case, in the late afternoon and evening) because I’m made so livid (or preferably, intrigued) by your perspective and new analysis.
However, keep in mind that I have a full-time job dealing with people. This is oftentimes exhausting and I want to let my brain turn to mush for a few hours a day. So there may be the intermittent post that is obviously less thought out than normal. Rather than crucifying me for my inability to write analyses on the level of The Economist, pretend that you’re reading US magazine. I’ll try to give you pretty pictures to compensate.
I also hope to add other sections of this webpage. As you can tell from the clunky design, I’m no webmaster. You should be glad that there is any functionality at all. Maybe when the spirit moves me, I’ll be creative (or pay somebody to do it for me.)
adamjhagerman 