This is the interview that @mehdibca has been kind enough to want to do for me.

I am very impressed with him wanting to do it so am just copying the whole thing here too, with his permission.

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Art and humans have a long lasting love story.

Hard to understand as it tries to imitate nature yet also encompasses the realm of the imaginary and a dimension laying between the conscious and its shadow function.
The beauty and emotional power it has on us remains a mystery, to me at least.
Today we will get inside the mind of a talented Visual Artist.
His acute attention to detail is impressive, a hedonist risk taker who lives life to the fullest.
Highly curious and imaginative, we are able to see that in his art.
His ability to bounce between introspective complexity and sensory sensitivity has shaped his world.

@spaingaroo is with us today and he is ready to share with various aspects of his personality and philosophy of life

We have decided to post this in two parts, as you will see @spaingaroo has done a very detail oriented style of answering my questions, and has sent me more than 6 000 words!!

So Part one today, and tomorrow part two. I hope you will all read both, as I was blown away by the effort that he has put in here to offer plenty of links and resources too.

Interview Questions

What hobby would you get into if time and money weren’t an issue?

Some sort of flying I suppose. Hang gliding or para gliding, or maybe even skydiving again.
I used to fly as a child, but now can't achieve lift-off.
Later, as a (childish) adult I have done four jumps from a plane but they were all static line jumps, virtually no free fall.
And then I ran out of money, and probably balls too.
The place I went to, called Aratula from what I can remember, which had a very small plane, and it wasn't possible to literally jump from it. One had to get out the door, climb down the wheel and then hang from the wing strut and only then was it safe to let go. Otherwise the possibility of being collected by the tail assembly was too great.
Or at least that's what they told me.
And it scared me shitless, like really.
This was in 1988, I was working at World Expo 88 in Brisbane, and I was 22 years old and a horrible drunk and ignorant cunt.
I suppose.

source youtube, Choo Dikka Dikka, they helped form the person I am

big shout out to the Brisvegas crowd, esp the fabulous @choogirl
(Even though she don't like me no more :()

Maybe I still am a cunt, and maybe that's why @choogirl don't like me no more, (lol) but I have been sober for years and I think I have come a long way.
At least I am conscious of how ignorant I remain today, whereas back then that was an anathema to my primate radio brain.

Maybe I would just start cycling again, I only stopped because time is an issue.

What fictional place would you most like to go?

I haven't come up with anything better than the very first thing that came to mind. Nihilon.
It's from a book, that I read many years, called Travels in Nihilon by Alan Sillitoe, the same guy who wrote the Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner which would have been how I discovered him back in those non digital days.

I was a long distance runner during my teenage years. I don't know how I did everything I did back then.

What job would you be terrible at?

ha, I have the unfortunate thing of being incredibly capable at almost everything.
Except singing I suppose, although I like to think of my self as a rock star, I have been assured time and time again, that I can cause psychological damage in the listeners
So I suppose I could have gone into punk or spoken word like Henry Rollins, but if I want to be on the safe side I will just say the job I would be worst at would be being part of a professional choir. (sometimes I am just completely stumped still by how some common English words are spelt. It took me about fifteen goes to spell that bloody word. The spellcheck here in Ghostwriter was as useless as tits on a bull, or my attempts were so lame. Even though I was an English teacher for nine years!)
The other type of job that I have no desire to have even though maybe I wouldn't be bad at it, is any type of position of power.

I have zero desire to rule over others, although I insist on pestering people to live in the same reality as me a lot.

What skill would you like to master?

Everybody was kung-fu fighting!!
Those guys have expert timing.
I wanted to master Ninjutsu when I was around eighteen, but did sweet FA about it.
I would like to be able to surf too

What game or movie universe would you most like to live in?

I think I live in a universe not unlike the one in "Being John Malcovich", or perhaps combined with the world of each of Charlie Kaufman's films.
I am the lead male character of "Adaptation" too, the Orchid Thief himself, except not at the same time, and I am both parts of Nicolas Cage's brother characters, who are the scriptwriter himself.
Anyone who has not experienced either or both of these movies, probably can't reach an understanding of the world which I inhabit.

And I only recently saw the film he wrote for Jim Carrey, whose name isn't coming to me right now, but as the DVD is on my shelf, I suppose only extreme laziness could keep me from finding out. (all of these movies are on my shelf. It's a good feeling)
And one thing I have never suffered from is extreme laziness.
"The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" ¡claro! coño.

That film had a different director than the first two I mentioned, which were made by Spike Jonze.
Eternal Sunshine was made by Michel Gondry.
I liked it too, but it was much closer to the same reality that most people share.
there's probably several others by him now, and I have the feeling I have seen one other. But anyway.
Reminds me of "Silver Linings Playbook" too.

What are some small things that make your day better?

What? Now?, or before Steemit?
Or theoretical or real?
this is just a hive of questions to me.

A good example of what has the potential to make my day better is you asking me if I wanted to do an interview!

Made my day complete, and several other ones too.
You and me ain't no movie stars,
what we are is what we are.
share a web, some loving and d-tube.
But that's enough for a working man,
what I am is what I am.

Another thing I connected very solidly today (yesterday really, as it's 5:55 am) with another steemiteer.
(I like steemiteer, rhymes with buccaneer, far more than steemiter, rhymes with turd. I also like steeminsta, but maybe that's because I'm bilingual.)
It felt really good, and I think I made a new real friend, only time will tell.
I won't call him out in public here just in case.

I don't make real friends easily as I am a pretty full on sort of person, and a lot of people don't seem to enjoy that.
Also I end up being pretty... I am stuck for the proper word in English. exigente
in Spanish and I am not sure if we use a word like that.
Demanding is the translation that comes to mind, but it's not what I want to say.
Although I am probably demanding too!
But those are both Steemit things, sort of.
Although I always thought I was going to be famous, with people asking for interviews and the like, as a famous artist, but I never really found the other part of the equation, the dealer and the critics who thought the same thing and did their part to make it so.

The Art World has done a pretty good job of getting along without me!

lol

If we were being more realistic I would say that there are several things that I know would make my day better, but I don't usually find the time for them, especially since I have been on Steemit.
and even before Steemit I haven't been good at self care ever.
The thing that makes my day better since years ago is working for many hours on artwork, while listening to any one of a number of courses I am doing, or podcasts or stand-up comedy.
The only way I have gotten through some of the dark nights of the soul that I have been passing through over the last few years has been stand-up.
I have become an expert consumer of stand-up comedy.
If anybody wants some recommendations, they only have to ask.
but I also am an avid consumer of lectures and podcasts, documentary series and the like.
I love music too, but I make very little time for it.
I can't explain why.
I need a lot of silence too.

Also I know that if I wanted to completely fix my mood, I could always just go for a ride on one of my bikes.

But I don't do that either, since all the dogs arrived basically.
I could do some exercise to make my body stronger again, but I haven't done any of that good shit since I have been on Steemit.

Luckily the dogs force me to go out for two to three hours every night, after midnight usually, and we commune with the stars and the moon and the darkness.
I am big on the dark, and I am big on connecting with the stars and the sky and realising how tragically unimportant we really are.

Who has impressed you most with what they’ve accomplished?

wow, that is difficult to answer.
Me maybe, or someone just like me.

Nah lol, but it depends.
Picasso made an arse load of work, I mean I have seen claims of 100,000 graphic works, 30,000 ceramic pieces etc. but he had the thing of being believed in from a child.
As he made more work his fame grew and his fortune too.

As I make more work I have less space in my house and less money left in my wallet.

I had that thing of being believed in too, I suppose, seeing as I sold all the work I did as a child but I got sidetracked by bad career advice, combined with my genial pig ignorance.
There are a heap of people who seem to be able to achieve so much, but I think they seem to have either money or support.

Maybe I will go with Louis CK*.
That guy has really put in the work to get to where he is, and he is willing to risk it all at every moment.
That's my sort of hero.

What are some of the best books that you’ve ever read?

Oh man, this is two thousand words already.
I don't know whether to answer with the best as in pleasure etc. or the best as in the most important, the ones that formed me.

And the list is pretty huge.

I read "Limits to Growth" when I was a kid, that really formed me. Club of Rome

I read the "1975 World Book Encyclopaedia" from cover to cover and then back again.
Was part of how I came to be so ignorant, as that was just propaganda.
I read all the year books and the science year too, I think we continued to receive them until I left school.

We also had the enormous two volume "World Book Dictionary", which I also read from cover to cover.

I read Stephen King for years, everything he published up to about halfway through the ""Dark Tower"" series, "The Gunslinger", when he started to lose me.
Later I read "Hearts in Atlantis" which wasn't bad, and "Needful Things", and "Misery" too.
I recently, a few years ago now, reread "The Stand", the extended version, but I think the originally published book was a better book. It was long enough at about 700 pages or something and the Version that King later published was ridiculously long at about 1200 pages and suffered for it.
I read the "Hunger Games" around that same time, (a few years back) and enjoyed those too. That's Suzanne Collins

I liked Peter Straub, Clive Barker and a few others too.

I read Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
Just grab anything by him.
I particularly liked "Bluebeard", as it is about the art world, but it isn't his best book.
The best one might be "Hocus Pocus", but that's debatable too. "Cat's Cradle", "Breakfast of Champions", and I recently reread the famous "Slaughterhouse Five" and enjoyed it immensely.

Anything and everything by Tom Robbins, esp "Another Roadside Attraction", "Still Life with Woodpecker" or from later, "Skinny Legs and All"

All his other books are great too. The one I least got into was the most famous one, "Even Cowgirls Get the Blues"

I especially liked the "Wasp Factory", by Iain Banks RIP, a first book masterpiece and then later I read the "Culture" series, "Consider Phlebus", "Use of Weapons" and "The Player of Games", I think they are called. That's the first three anyway.
They were by a writer called Iain M. Banks, but it was the same guy.
Incredibly prolific.

"Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn was a revelation.
I went on to read everything he published.
I particularly liked "The Story of B" but more for the lectures transcribed at the end of the book, in the appendices than for the story itself.
Anyhow, I do consider them must reads.

"Endgame", by Derrick Jensen was also a life changing experience for me, I also have read almost everything he has published.
he has one of the coolest titles too, "Strangely Like War" which is a book about logging.

Speaking of cool titles and cool books, I recently came across "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck" and that is great. you can get a taste on the author's website
I wish I had read it twenty years ago, before it was even published probably. I read it online but will be buying a copy

And also in the cool titles section, how's about "Every Love Story is a Ghost Story" A life story of David Foster Wallace RIP which I am reading at the moment, (falsely) billed as the best biography ever published, but certainly one of the best titles ever.

"The Rider", by Tim Krabbe is the best book about cycling ever written I think.

And "The Curious Incident of the Dog at Midnight" was tremendous. that's by Mark Haddon.
He has another book called "A Spot of Bother" which is a great book too.

"Immoderate Greatness", "Collapse", and a host of other books, and heaps of John Michael Greer's books and blog posts have been turned into unofficial Audio books by a man called Rev Michael Dowd and you can find them by searching for "Grace limits audio"

every hour you invest there will make you smarter.
Every time I listen to Dowd read Greer, I just feel like I have gotten smarter and wiser.
and they are good fun too.

John Michael Greer is better known as the Archdruid Report, but that blog is now closed, and I have linked his new one on his name.

that'll probably do, although I could go on.

Robert Hughes "Things I didn't know" is great as he is one of the greats of twentieth century art criticism, although that book is about the tall poppy syndrome in Australia, or it's about a motor vehicle accident, whatever you like.
"A Basque History of the World" was a real eye opener for me too, and I have read a couple of English language histories of Spain too, like "Fire in the Blood" and Giles Tremlett's "Ghosts of Spain".
I am sure I will kick myself later for my omissions.

Oh, for sure, "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress", by Robert A Heinlein is a formative book and should be required reading for getting onto the blockchain.

And Bill Bonner is also required reading, his book Hormegeddon, How too much of a good thing leads to disaster

when I go to get a link for Bill Bonner,funny thing I see
Nikola Tesla's face staring back at me

and when I went to the book shelves it occurred to me how many I forgot

Ok, so that concludes part one.

If you want to see more of @spaingaroo and see some of his artworks, his website is

http://www.spaingaroo.com

he gave me this footer to use

If anyone would like to see a more extensive, although unfortunately by no means complete, collection of SpaiNgaroo artworks, they can visit my main domain

There is some work for sale at Saatchi online gallery
and a Redbubble print on demand shop
and a fabric and wallpaper shop on Spoonflower too although many of the designs are still not available for sale.
sorry

Blame it on the sunshine,
blame it on the moonlight,
blame it on the good times,
now blame it on the steemit.

video bicho hmmm... sometimes
don't really use twitter, but robots do
the facialbook, if you must

Well, as usual thank you for coming by to anyone who is reading these words, if you have gotten this far, and don't be afraid to love