I still do it all the time. Whenever I'm upset over something, I imagine all my friends, relatives and colleagues gathered at my bier. They are very, very sorry they weren't nicer to me while I lived. Self-pity is something I've worked very hard to maintain. Why abandon it just because you grow up? Self-pity is something that children are very good at, which must mean it is natural and important. Imagining yourself dead is the cheapest, sleaziest, most satisfying form of childish self-pity. How sad and remorseful and guilty all those people are, standing by your great bronze coffin. They can't even look each other in the the eye because they know that the death of this decent and compassionate man is the result of a conspiracy they all took part in. The coffin is banked with flowers and lined with a nabbed fabric in salmon or peach. What wonderful cross-currents of self-pity and self-esteem you are able to wallow in, seeing yourself laid out in a dark suit and tie, looking tanned, fit and rested, as they say of presidents after vacations. But there is something even more childish and satisfying than self-pity, something that explains why I try to see myself dead on a regular basis, a great fellow surrounded by sniveling mourners. It is my way of punishing people for thinking their own lives are more important than mine.

favorite films: The Good the Bad and the Ugly, Easy Rider, Rashomon, Dr. Strangelove: Or..., Vanishing Point, Knife in the Water, Persona, Blue Velvet, Fargo, Straw Dogs, The Wild Bunch, La Strada, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stalker, Solyaris, Once Upon a Time in the West, The Bicycle Thief, Le Samourai, La Haine, Repulsion, Seven Samurai, Amores Perros, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Fountain, Buffalo '66, Band of Outsiders, Viridiana, Baraka

favorite directors: Andrei Tarkovsky, Roman Polanski, Sergio Leone, Darren Aronofsky, Akira Kurosawa, Sam Peckinpah, Stanley Kubrick,

favorite musical acts: Boris, Modern Life is War, Feist, Lightning Bolt, Prefuse 73, Dinosaur Jr., Jenn Grant, Sleater-Kinney, Venetian Snares, Wintersleep, Devendra Banhart, Animal Collective, Bad Brains, The Tough Alliance, Black Sabbath, M.I.A., Cuff the Duke, Headlights

favorite visual artists & designers: Joseph Muller-Brockmann, Armin Hoffman, Piet Zwart, Paul Schuitema, David Carson, Salvador Dali, Renee Magritte

favorite authors: Chuck Palahniuk (Choke), Kurt Vonnegut (Breakfast of Champions), William Burroughs (Naked Lunch), Jack Kerouac (On the Road, Cormac McCarthy (Blood Meridian)

...and Kenta Kobashi.