Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) and pro wrestling - especially Ring of Honor, TNA (WHY do I do this to myself every fucking week?????), Pro Wrestling NOAH, Dragon Gate, classic New Japan, old Michinoku Pro, the sadly-missed FMW & 1990s All Japan, all kinds of Joshi and some quality indie stuff like Pro Wrestling Guerilla and Chikara Pro, 1970s Japanese pro wrestling. And of course, LUCHA LIBRE - the greatest form of combat/entertainment known to man! NFL/CFL/college football (thats right football, none of that silly soccer). Reading, music and travel. Museums and galleries. Hanging out with my goofy friends. Writing for www.kakutougi.info and Fighters Only magazine.
Meh.
Robert Johnson, Lightnin' Hopkins, Metallica, Faith No More, Dick Justice, Black Keys, Smashing Pumpkins, Weezer, Blind Boy Fuller, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Johnny Cash, Manic Street Preachers, Foo Fighters, Mad Capsule Markets, White Stripes, Depeche Mode, Pantera, Leadbelly, Sepultura, Mad Capsule Markets, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Cathedral, Mississippi John Hurt, White Stripes, Breeders, Hole, Clem Snide, Sick of it All, Masters of Reality, the Eels, Paradise Lost, Tom Petty, REM, Primus, Son House, Rollins Band, Carcass, Nailbomb, Killers, Iron Maiden, Blind Willie McTell.
A few random titles that spring to mind: Lord of the Rings trilogy, Best In Show, Pulp Fiction, Drunken Master, Pom Poko, Grizzly Man, Bully, Chasing Amy, Lost in Translation, Das Experiment, Bad Boy Bubby, Grave of the Fireflies, Die Hard, Oldboy, Hard Boiled, Bob Roberts, Sympathy for Mr Vengeance, Project A, Borat, Die Hard Trilogy, Jackass 1 & 2, Shawshank Redemption, Children of Men, Murderball, Hostel, Taxi Driver, Pan's Labyrinth, Batman Begins, Rocky, Bubba Ho-Tep, Spirited Away, Sin City, Goodbye Lenin, Bad Santa, Zoolander, City of God, Donnie Darko, Finding Nemo, the Descent, Dunston Checks In, Evil Dead 2, Army of Darkness, A Mighty Wind, Nightmare Before Christmas, March of the Penguins, A Better Tomorrow, One Day in September, Perfect Blue, Shawshank Redemption, Chopper, the Village, Gladiator, Gorky Park, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Akira, Stand By Me, Roujin Z, Paperhouse, Unbreakable, Sonatine, Night Watch, Kind Hearts and Coronets, Rashomon, A History of Violence.
Seinfeld, Heroes, the Ultimate Fighter, Trailer Park Boys, the Shield, Entourage, Family Guy, Futurama, King of Queens, CSI: Miami, the Office (UK & US), Jericho, The Fast Show, Rising Damp, Dexter, Corner Gas, Life on Mars, Jeeves & Wooster, Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares, A Bit of Fry & Laurie, 15 Storeys High, Peep Show, Yes Minister/Prime Minister, Derren Brown, Extras, the West Wing, Shameless, South Park, My Name is Earl, Scrubs, Dexter, Frasier, Blackadder, American Dad, Curb Your Enthusiasm, the Simpsons, Channel 4 News, Six Feet Under, I'm Alan Partridge. Documentaries on religion, nature, animals, history, politics and war.
George MacDonald Fraser, Misha Glenny, Edgar Allan Poe, Andrey Kurkov, Chuck Palahniuk, William Boyd, Herge, Dave Gorman, Mikhail Bulgakov, Jane Goodall, Norman Finkelstein, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, James Ellroy, George Plimpton, John Simpson, Terry Pratchett, Iain Banks, Jared Diamond, Gordon Corrigan, Eric Hobsbawm, Ian Buruma, Josef Skvorecky, Marlene Van Niekerk, JM Coetzee, Goscinny et Uderzo, Timothy Garton Ash, Franz Kafka, Ryszard Kapuscinski, Stephen Fry, Gunter Grass, Michael Marshall (Smith), HG Wells, Johnathan Swift, Voltaire, Jules Verne, Joe Klein, Christopher Buckley, Carl Hiassen, George Orwell, Slavenka Drakulic, John Pilger, Ryu Murakami.
Wouldn't say I have heroes (despite the captioning in some of my pics) but there are people I admire.People like Walter Autrey, Danny Hodge (read the blog), Booker T. Washington, Dr Wagner Jr, Voltaire, One Eyed Frank McGee, Walter Payton, Jim Cornette, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Norman Finkelstein, John Wilkes, Bill Hicks, Jane Goodall, Muhammad Ali, George Plimpton, Kazushi Sakuraba, Paul Robeson, Frederick the Great, Larry Holmes, Herge, Lou Thesz, Joe Sacco, Randy Couture, Niccolo Machiavelli, Lightnin' Hopkins, Minoru Suzuki and Stephen Fry. Some fictional characters are worth a mention too. Most notably Fielding Mellish, Dr Tobias Funke, Bertie Wooster, Rupert Rigsby, Roger the Alien, Shane Vendrell, Sir Humphrey Appleby, Horatio Caine, Captain Haddock and George Costanza, Paddington Bear.