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I’ve enjoyed meeting you all over the past couple of months, and thank you for helping me to feel welcome at ZSR. At the request of our very own blog-czar, and in case anyone happens to be interested, here are a few details that may help you to feel you know me a bit better.

First of all – there’s just no getting around it – I’m from Iowa, home to such cultural treasures as the Field of Dreams and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and birthplace of, among other notables, Herbert Hoover and Bill Bryson. I was born (almost literally) in the shadow of Maytag’s (now defunct) headquarters in Newton and grew up in a suburb north of Des Moines. My Midwestern roots notwithstanding, I have lived for six out the past seven years right here in the Old North State, first in the Chapel Hill-area and now in W-S.

I am an alumnus of the University of Iowa and of UNC-Chapel Hill, where I studied philosophy and classical languages. Besides reading and writing, I enjoy brewing beer, playing board games, hiking, and spending time with my partner, Catherine, and my dog, Gus.