"Remember, you're unique, just like everyone else."

In the vastness of cyberspace, vanity sites like this one are ignored by pretty much everybody except for spammers and pornbots. So why do I bother? Because I'm vain, of course. And unique, too--don't forget that.

The Onion has a great article about people who create their own home pages. Of course, Barry Ploegel probably gets more hits than me. Like, a lot more hits. The truth hurts.

Welcome to my home page, anyway. I'm Ethan Fode. This site houses my rather small pile of personal projects, loosely broken up into the following categories:

• Poetry of the non-metrical and vaguely accessible variety.
• Music of the orchestral-electronic variety.
• Prose both short and long form, fiction and nonfiction. The first few chapters of my book will be posted here.
• Financial Planning information, FAQ's, and, eventually, some useful calculators.
• Homebrewing, where I discuss our current and past efforts at brewing beer, and describe a little bit about how we do our thing.
• Miscellaneous materials that don't fit anywhere else.
• Cool Links that folks might find interesting.

• 5/15/12. I totally made it on time this month! Woot! The only thing I have is a brief blurb on investment return for people interested in that kind of thing. Next month, there will probably be no update, since we're moving back to Alaska (goodbye Australia, I hardly knew ye!). And after that, who knows?
• 4/17/12. There's a legitimate reason for the lateness here. My wife and I were in Uluru (aka Ayer's Rock, that big red protuberance in Australia's Northern Territory) and got back late last night. This month I have a bit of an odd, overlong song called Blue. Also a poem called Beach (for lack of a better title). Here is a link to a unique slideshow project by a friend of mine called "Reflections of Paris" featuring, unsurprisingly, pictures taken in Paris.
• 3/17/12. 2 days late. I keep missing this self-imposed deadline. Why? Hell, I don't know. Lack of discipline? Oxygen overdose? Spending too much time taking care of my special needs dog? Sorry, fan base! This month the only thing I have is a rather sketchily thought-out blurb on surviving retirement. As a guy who's currently surviving in a semi-retired state, I have a few ideas about how to make it work, right or wrong.
• 2/17/12. A few days late. Just got back from Japan. Dude, I'm so huge in Japan! Well, okay, maybe not. Anyway. all I have this month is a song called Scott that I wrote for a friend of mine. He was supposed to write lyrics, which he never did because, unlike me, he has a life. My fiction is still languishing, but I've posted an update on the Rejection page.
• 1/16/12. This month, I've changed it up a little bit and posted a blurb about compound interest and why it's important to start investing at an early age. Simplistic, but I'm hoping it's useful. It was fun to draw the graph, at least. Don't be a dumbass: invest while you're young.
• 12/20/11. Ugh. Late update this month because I've been horribly unmotivated. Against my better judgment, I've decided to post a piece of crappy flash fiction. This unpublishable piece of tripe will never see the light of day (except on my vanity site. Hooray for vanity sites!). Merry Christmas and all that jazz.
• 11/15/11. This week I've added a poem, Things Are Always As They Seem, which is--unsurprisingly, for those who know me--about escapism. I've also added a link to the home page of Anna Tambour, an author I met at a conference in Canberra. Her page has all sorts of interesting links to stories, blogs, recipes, all kinds of stuff. I've just scratched the surface; there's tons of content.
• 10/15/11. There was pretty much no hope of an update this month thanks to eviction, moving, loss of internet, etc.
• 9/15/11. Posted a song, Grind, which is an attempt at a more traditional song structure. Eviction in process.
• 8/15/11. For once, I am updating this web page on the right day. I've added a piece of flash fiction called False Dogs. We are going to get evicted from our place in about a week and a half, so the next update may or may not be on time, depending on whether we're living in a cardboard box, or we actually found a new apartment.
• 7/05/11. Early update because my mom's coming to town tomorrow and I won't have time once she shows up. Put up a poem entitled Lost. I now have a Rejection page.
• 6/15/11. Posted another song, Fearless, and also spent an ungodly amount of time creating a guestbook which can be found here (the guestbook template is from Lazarus, very cool, check it out). On a side note, I think php is the most retarded computer language on the planet. Could they have made it any less intuitive?
• 5/19/11. I made the mistake of getting addicted to a computer game about a week ago. It was a terrific struggle to wrench myself away for the 2 hours it takes to update the page. I added some of our latest beers to the homebrew logger and also a story, Flash Hole.
• 4/19/11. Slow on the update due to visitors from the Northern Hemisphere. Updated the prose page, added a poem entitled Polar Bear Encounter and added a link to Gaming Milieus on the miscellany page. Also added a few addresses to the links page.
• 3/15/11. Added a bunch of links. The homebrewing page is now up (and listed in the categories above). I've also got a page of very rough animation work I've done. Plus some other random crap. I'm hopeful that next month I can post a link to a piece of flash fiction I wrote.
• 2/15/11. Added a song, Cleft. I've been trying to find decent poems to post, but can't seem to make myself post anything because they're all pretty drecky.
• 1/19/11. No update this month for various reasons. Unemployment is sure hard on the schedule! Everything takes longer now.
• 12/18/10. Late update, Celis. This one came out all right.
• 11/15/10. Song of the month, B3. B3, coincidentally, is also niacin, though there's no relationship between the song and the vitamin. Wrote an article about the move to Sydney and how it affected my cheapness; you can find it here. No poetry lately.
• 10/15/10. An (old) new poem, Acculturation, and a sort of mellow song, Perkish. Also a random video, How to drown whilst camping, taken on a rafting trip back in 2008.
• 9/15/10. No update this month, thanks to a semi-hectic schedule with the move down to Sydney. Goodbye, Alaska!
• 8/18/10. Whoops, missed the 15th by a long shot due to travel and general lassitude. Another song, Chor2, and a lugubrious poem, Two Lives.
• 7/16/10. A very old song of mine, Wither.
• 6/15/10. One more song, Drub (a bit of a retread) and a sort of rumination on insurance: what it is, why you buy it, etc. I'm in the process of submitting some poems, which is why I haven't posted anything recently.
• 5/15/10. Continuing with the monthly updates, this one on time, even! New song called Tbone (a bit of a retread) and some articles on being cheap: the basics and how to have fun on a budget.
• 4/16/10. A financial blurb about inflation: Why Inflation Sucks, and also an old poem, Hours.
• 3/15/10. Nother song, Gitch, and a poem, Replay. Linked to Jim Ruland's blog and a short story he wrote. Good stuff.
• 2/15/10. Added the National Ski Patrol to the link page (and a bunch of other links). Added a miscellany page. And an odd poem, Returning to the World.
• 1/17/10. Added a song, Pingslow.
• 12/16/09. Bio and finance pages are up, for better or for worse. Finance page could use some more material, but at least I've got it together.
• 11/17/09. Looks like the 17th is my day for updates. Added a song: Fhud.
• 10/17/09. A little late, but added a poem, The Fight. Maybe I'll put up the bio page this week.
• 9/15/09. Has it been a month already? Added a song, Cobbler.
• 8/15/09. Added 2 songs, Cheez and Blown. Added a poem, Gliding Lessons
• 7/15/09. Added 2 songs: "Gocrazy" and "Bleak". Continued to tinker with content.
• 6/16/09. Added 3 songs: "Inchoate", "Streamer", "Zero2". Added the poem "Dawson". Link web page is now up! Updated some content.
• 2/19/09. Fixed some formatting issues. I need to add more stuff.
• 1/27/09. Finally added music, some poetry, working on dead links...whee, html...