When I lived in Japan, office blurbs were easy: I had my prepared speech on a worn and faded piece of card. Words spelled out phonetically, with scratches and scribbles as I worked out better ways to say, “Hey folks, thanks for the gig” in archaic formal Japanese. I’d even prepared a spiel for websites: “Card-carrying slacker doing his best for team couch-potato in the land of mystery breads, strange hair cuts and raw fish”. Too easy.

On my own site just throwing that up and calling it a day is, I feel, unacceptable. To the right you’ll find some of my favourite posts. Below there’s some history and a longer (and possibly slightly more coherent) bio. A summary of dealings elsewhere can be found externally at danwoods.name. If you’d like to get in touch, drop me a line – I’m a sucker for mail. Or, if you’d prefer, here’s some pictures of pumpkins.

Much love,

Dan

The Little Details

I was born in 1982 in Perth, Western Australia but promptly relocated to Tucson, Arizona where I spent my early years learning the names of dinosaurs and devising increasingly elaborate methods of grazing my knees and losing toenails. Much like Perth, Tucson was dusty, hot and dry. In the summer we’d bury ourselves in the mud our teachers would create with a hose buried in the playground and then run around pretending to be zombies.

Whilst in America I developed an unhealthy addiction to both Commodore 64 (Moon Patrol! Spyhunter! That jaunty little man with a jetpack!) and plastic cheese in a can. The fun had to end and when I was six, our family relocated to Australia and I started school in Perth.

Textbook Terror

School was twelve years of fun and excitement (both debatable) spent at local government schools in Perth. Seven years at Mount Lawley Primary followed by five at Mount Lawley High. Loved: Media and English, anything that let me be creative. Did not Love: quadratic equations, imaginary numbers and haircuts.

This balance of likes and dislikes became increasingly problematic as my studies had been focused on subjects aimed at continuing to CompSci after school was done and dusted. On completion of the final TEE exam, I decided I had written my last equation and went home to find a towel to throw in. Being forced to sit in front of a computer and spend all day writing code was the last thing I wanted to do with my life.

Tertiary Tango

After a brief crisis involving a large-scale shuffling of priorities and an equally large-scale consumption of beer, I pulled my finger out, fudged a portfolio and landed a spot doing graphic and multimedia design at Curtin. After three years spent focussing on the finer points of fluid dynamics (at the tav), sports science (on the oval) and international relations (hackey sack with the international crew) I had a piece of paper that said I was a designer. The end result: a degree that enabled me to sit in front of a computer in an office and write code all day. Wonderful.

Now I had my piece of paper that said I was qualified, I founded a small design firm called Amoeba and we made some beautiful things. We dreamed up bizarre schemes and plotted branding each other with bar codes. One day, whilst sitting in the office writing code, I decided that running a business wasn’t really what I was after at this stage of my life. It was time for another priority shuffle.

Takoyaki on Tatami

I fled to Japan on the JET programme where I taught for three years at Suzurandai-Nishi Senior High School, a small government high school located in the north-western part of Kobe City. I lived by myself in a dilapidated teacher’s apartment on the top of mountain and in winter the pipes froze and the neighbourhood kids threw snowballs at me as I wobbled down the hill on his bike. I had the time of my life.

Soundbites

If I were a cult film, I would be called:
Revenge of the Paleites: The Slobatic Agenda

What colour are your shoelaces?
Brown. The end.

If your jeans had a hole in them, would you patch it up?
My favourite pair of jeans have been patched about 4 times now. I won’t let them die. Ever.

Hometown?
Perth, Western Australia. Most isolated capital city in the world. Beautiful beaches, great mix of people but not a whole lot to do.

Currently Living?
Kyanberrah, Oz

So, how much coffee do you drink anyways?
I’m the world’s seventh least pleasant human being until I’ve had the first coffee of the morning. By the second I’ve reached my emotional baseline.

Favourite Alcoholic Beverage:
A good micro brew wheat beer on a hot day, or a negroni if I’m classing it up.

Best movie line. Ever?
Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.

Most embarrassing musical purchase:
I think the first CD I ever bought was the soundtrack to Priscilla: Queen of the Desert. I’ll also admit to being in possession of an East 17 tape at one stage in my life. I can’t remember who purchased it for me, but I do remember listening to and enjoying it. Ooh, I can’t believe I just admitted to that.

What kind of music first rocked your little world?
I was actually largely ambivalent towards music until early high-school. At some stage I started listening to JJJ (it may have been around the same time my father purchased the TISM single, “Greg! The stop sign!” and would not stop playing it. I do remember that it was during the time breakfast was still being done by Mikey Robbins, Paul McDermott and the Sandman and Helen Razor and Judith Lucy were doing the afternoons) and it all just kind of exploded and went from there.

Do mix-tapes rule?
Yes.

What about lists?
Yes, lists also rule.

To whom do all your bases belong to?
Cats. Definitely cats.

About the Site

I’ve been writing stuff down in some form or another for quite some time now. Most of pre 2002 content in here is from the WAGZ Columns, an experiment in community building on one of my previous sites. When WAGZ blew up in 2003, I migrated the content of my own column across to Movable Type, signed up for a domain, and went from there. In mid 2005 I changed content management systems again, this time to the free and open source Textpattern. I tend to get bored, design-wise, and roll over the design once every couple of months. If you’re interested in other design work I’ve done, the best place to check is amoeba.