About Keith Metcalfe

Here is a newer and better About Keith Metcalfe webpage: http://keithmetcalfe.epizy.com/OldSite_NewLayout_068/About_Keith_Metcalfe_OldSite.html

I'm a Marin County native who has lived here for all my life with the exception of 3½ years that I spent in upstate New York to graduate from Syracuse University. There I majored in Film, Computers, & Philosophy. I attended high school at the Branson School, in Ross.

I grew up in Kentfield, at the edge of the Greenbrae Hills. For 6 years I lived in an apartment near the Civic Center, but in 1997 new owners bought the building and evicted all the tenants (including me) on Christmas, forcing me to move. Since 1998 I've lived near Kaiser Hospital in San Rafael. I had several roommates at my old place, but have had enough financial success to afford my own place, and apparently having a one bedroom apartment (by yourself) is no small feat in Marin County.

My parents are Phyllis and Richard Metcalfe. I have a brother, Ryan, and a sister, Kathryn. I also have a half-brother, Kevin. My sister now lives in San Diego and works as a teacher and as a stage actress. My brother had been working for various newspapers (including in the midwest and northwest), before landing a regular gig at our local Marin County Independent Journal. My father retired from being a corporate insurance broker.

Here is our Metcalfe Family Crest.

Here is the main photo page of Keith Metcalfe, Keithco, and his Family: http://keithmetcalfe.epizy.com/PhotoIndex.html

And here is my old photo page for Keith Metcalfe : http://keithmetcalfe.epizy.com/OldSite_NewLayout_068/Photos_OldSite.html

Hobbies Include: Movies, computer games, and Amelioration. I also like to exercise, and train in various martial arts, as well as fencing. I also highly enjoy taking and editing digital photos. I have several review sites for all these things.

Favorite Art Form: Movies. I never show up late for one, and always sit through the credits.

Favorite Food: Don't have one. I'm just not a big food person. As a matter of fact, I probably wouldn't eat if I didn't need food to survive.

Favorite Pet: Cats

Favorite time of my life: Right before college, when I worked at the Rafael Theater in downtown San Rafael. It was an old theater that had a balcony and lots of secret rooms, but what made it my favorite time were the people there. It was an important time for me, and I grew a lot socially.

Worst job I ever had would have been the 3½ years at CSAA. I was an insurance claims adjustor and everyone who came to see me had either hit someone, was hit by someone, had their car broken into, or was hurt in an accident. The only thing that would make the majority of these people happy again was cold hard cash, and believe me this attitude can really bring out the worst in people. And the work culture was very bad too. It was a lot closer to Dilbert than any job should be.

Favorite Books: "The Once and Future King", "The Godfather", "Ender's Game". If graphic novels count, then "Dark Knight Returns", "Watchmen", "Elektra Assassin", "Sandman", "Sin City", Miller's run on "Daredevil", Bendis' run on "Daredevil", and Carey's "Lucifer".

Recent Books I've Read (that I liked a lot): "Ender's Shadow", "Shadow of the Hegemon", "Blood Meridian", several Jack Reacher novels with my favorite being "Worth Dying For", "American Gods", "Odd Thomas", "1493", and the first Harry Potter book. Also, I recently read through all the Thomas Harris Hannibal Lecter books.

Recent Video Games (as of 2013) I've played and highly enjoyed: Civilization 5, Batman Arkham Asylum, Last of Us, Team Fortress 2, Morrowind, Hit Man Assassin, Wizardry 8, Rise of Nations, Half Life 2, Prince of Persia (2003)

Recent TV Shows I'm watching: Star Trek Discovery, Mad Men, All the Marvel Netflix shows (especially Daredevil and The Punisher), Simpsons, West Wing, The Shield, Veronica Mars, and The Daily Show. I got a TIVO back in 2005, and still don't stream much. And boy when I got that Tivo did it change my TV viewing habits! I'm certain I'm watching more TV than before because shows I would otherwise have missed, the Tivo picks up and reminds me.

Special Skill: Am able to successfully divide by zero!

Movies are a large part of the 'artistic' side of my life. I love to watch them and someday hope to help make them. I own a Laserdisc player, and resisted the push to the (initially) inferior DVD format, as was true for most movie-philes. I listen to most director's commentaries that I can, and write reviews on the RateThatCommentary web site.

Like most people who love films as much as I do, I have many opinions on the films that I watch. You can see a listing of star ratings for films, writing reviews, youtube reviews, as well as an index listing all of my laserdiscs I own.

I've worked/volunteered at the Mill Valley film festival. Mostly computer work, but it got my access to getting to meet and talk with various stars. See photos:

I actually really enjoy designing databases with Microsoft Access. And I've been paid well to do so. Same with building and fixing computers, both for large scale corporations and for individual people.

I have trained in Martial Arts for most of my adult life (and pretended to for most of my juvenile life). Since 2003, I have been training in Wing Tsun under Sifu Simon Mayer who trained at the Wing Tsun castle in Germany. Before that I studied Aikido under Sensai J.D. Sandoval. Previously, I studied Wing Chun/Tsun under the tutelage of Derek Kolchak. Previous to that I studied Hung Gar under Sifu Yew Ching Wong in Chinatown, San Francisco. I have also trained in Wing Chun under Chris Cunningham out of Syracuse, NY who also had roots in Buffalo, and the Bronx, NY. I also have rankings from the East West Karate Association and have trained under accomplished Tai Chi, Weapon, and other Karate instructors. See my Martial Arts Page for more details.

For about two decades, on and off, I fenced at the Marin Fencing Academy. Although much more of a 'sport' than a 'fighting art', it does teach many important things such as focus, minimal motion, and the importance of defense before offense. I've also been an assistant instructor at the club, and at Marin Academy High School.

I was a large comic-book collector for most of the 80's, and devoured all works by the three Gods of Graphic Novels, Frank Miller, Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, and most recently Garth Ennis. I also have every issues of the Savage Sword of Conan series, and the regular Conan comic series. The last two series I subscribed to were Hellblazer and Sandman. Miller has really slowed down his writing of late, and I hope someday that he may once again reach the lofty heights that his "Dark Knight Returns" and "Dark Knight: Year One" set over two decades ago. I still consider issue #2 of 'Returns' to be one of the masterpieces of modern writing. I actually wrote an English term paper lauding it. Click here to read my Epinions review of The Dark Knight Returns. Although not as detailed as that term paper, I am quite proud of it.

I used to write reviews of graphic novels on Epinions.com, on Batman: Year One, Sin City, Hell & Back, Ronin, 300, Big Fat Kill, Daredevil: Marked for Death, and Wolverine.

If you like "Sin City", then check out this excellent Sin City Fan Page.

I used to read books a lot. But then the internet came along. In the late 80's and early 90's, accessing local BBS's from my Atari ST took up some of my time, but after building my first IBM computer in 1993, and then getting onto the Internet in 1994, my reading of literature dramatically declined. Back then I loved and often read Clive Barker, Eric Van Lustbader, and read many reference and educational books (like Carl Sagan). I got a job that had a 60+ mile commute in 2008, and for two years I started listening to a lot of books on tape. More recently I've been commuting by BART for an hour, and caught up on a lot of comic books I missed since I started collecting.

I used to spend an unhealthy amount of time playing computer games, and still do when otherwise bored. To see a list of my favorites check out my new page of video game reviews. I got into a mode of trying to earn the most Xbox Achievements for a while.

Other interests include the Simpsons, Anti-smoking, & Photoshop (Apparently I'm better than most non-professionals at it.) .

Other things I like are Amelioration, Star Trek, XKCD, Dilbert, Leonardo Da Vinci, the TV show Homicide, Alexander the Great, Cats (the animals, not the musical), the oxford comma, & more that I can't remember.

On a more disturbing note, check out the Helico-Bacter page for info on a one-time Ailment.

Page last updated on: 11/28/2006

© Keithco 2006