I’m originally from San Luis Obispo—a coastal city in central California. After high school I moved north and earned my B.A. in philosophy at UC Davis, taking my junior year abroad at King’s College, London, and playing with graphite pencils whenever I could. During my time in London I came across a book on nutrition—the first I’d ever considered reading—and from it learned some pretty horrific things about the effects animal products can have on the human body. I promptly became vegan. (Subsequently I read Animal Liberation, which would give any sane person sufficient moralistic reasons to be vegan in today’s world.) From Davis I went to New York City, where I attended the Natural Gourmet Institute for Food and Health—the vegetarian culinary school in the US, located in Chelsea. There I spent most of my free time working in raw food joints, frequenting subversive bookstores…and getting lost. In the fall of 2006 I entered a PhD program in philosophy at the University of Southern California. After just over a year, I was offered an opportunity to study oil painting privately with Jason Mayr, an amazing impressionist painter who’s currently living and working on the central coast of California, for which USC granted me two semesters leave in 2007. I’ve since returned to finish my degree, but still paint and sketch frequently. Though I came to USC to study philosophy of language, I’m now interested primarily in political philosophy and philosophy of law, including the history, theory, and practice of anarchism. I’m scheduled to graduate around 2011.