Pop Quiz

by Ron Mier

 
1.   What is your name?         Ron Mier
2.   How old are you?         Thirty-one
3.   Where do you live?         Albuquerque, NM
4.   What do you do for a living?         I still don't know what I want to be when I get even older. A professional something that has to do with computers.
5.   Do you drive?         In vicious circles.
6.   What do you do for joy?         Sing as loudly as possible in the supermarket, much to the chagrin of my two sweet children.
        Laugh at myself when I get caught singing to myself in the car by someone in a car next to me.
        Read aloud to my kids before bed in a loud and overly eager performing voice.
        Paint loud and shivering images of joy, pain, love, grief and adoration.
7.   What is your pet peeve?         My own inability to mobilize.
      And how much does it weigh?         Billions and billions of pounds, kinda like a white dwarf.
      Does it sleep by the door?         No, it just kinda leans against it.
      Is it housebroken?         It leaves trails everywhere so that I know where to find it later.
8.   Do you write, paint or play?  All at the same time?  (While juggling a dozen eggs and riding a unicycle?)         I write, but like I'm composing a thesis.
        I paint with abandon.
        I play when I like.
        And I crash when I do it all at once, wearing the egg as a neat little facial cleansing mask.
9.   Who is the most impressive character you've ever met?         My children impress me, as does anyone willing to look at the world with the same awe and feelings of optimism for things that may be.
10.   Have you ever read, acted, performed, thrown up, etc. in public?         Was the elementary school hopeful for stage and screen during my renditions of "This Land is Your Land" in full Uncle Sam regalia, one of three wise guys singing "We Three Kings", and the creator, producer and director of a lewd rendition of "Three Little Maids from School are We" in drag. How I got away with that in Catholic school I will never understand. The nuns got some kind of sick and wild laugh out of that one though. Throwing up? No, I don't think so.
11.  What piece of literature or art moved your soul to ecstatic waves of bliss?         Carlos Castaneda's "The Second RIng of Power" at age fourteen, Kahlil Gibran's "The Prophet" at age fifteen and Hunter S. Thompson's "The Curse of Lono" at age sixteen. Good thing mom never paid a whole lot of attention to what junior was reading...
12.  What was the first thing you ever encountered that made you realise that art is important?         My recognition of the deafening sound of the silence that surrounded me and recognizing that it was a portal for me to explore.
13.  Would you consider yourself an artist?  A good one?  Why or why not?         I hate trick questions. I am an artist, but it's not my fault! I believe what I do is right for me and enjoy when others get a jolt out of it too.
14.  What are your favorite things that have ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with anything else? EVERYTHING has to do with EVERYTHING else...well, except for government intelligence
15.  What are your favorite things that have ABSOLUTELY everything to do with everything else?         Children, deep cool water in the summer, uncontrollable laughter, deep stares with strangers you want to meet.
16.  What's the meaning of life?         I hope to catch a glimpse, but never expect to fully know.
17.  Why?         Because it's much more than I could deal with, I suspect.
18.  True or false: the Three Stooges represent the apex of American cultural achievement.         Apes, maybe. Cultural achievement. No. Funny when I was a kid? Only when I was REALLY high.
19.  True or False: Shemp was funnier than the original Curly.         Never developed a taste for shrimp, I mean Shemp.
20.  Who's da man?         Waiting to see...but I have my suspicions.