Both Ben's parents are currently lawyers of some stripe or another, and his mom probably could have been a judge if she wanted to. Having two lawyers for parents has surely warped Ben in immeasurable ways, some of them perhaps even beneficial.

Currently, Ben's father is practicing contract and environmental law in Denver, CO, and his mother is a Professor at the Law school at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Yeah, but who is Ben Cantrick?

Well, Ben is first and foremost a Type A personality. He's time and goal conscious and slightly perfectionistic (read: slightly anal). Also, according to the keirsey test for personality types, Ben is an INTP.

Ben is a knowledge and challenge-a-holic. (Like I said, Type A) His great love of reading may have come from the fact that it was really the most difficult and yet most enjoyable thing to do. (Attributable to his possible dyslexia and lawyer genes, perhaps?)

Ben also loves computers. All kinds of computers. At all levels. Ben loves hardware. Ben loves software. Ben loves computer games. Ben loves operating systems. Ben enjoys constructing simple circuits out of 7400 series logic gates and wiring them into his computer. Ben also enjoys writing 3-D graphics routines and file-format translation programs. Ben likes to write TSRs. Ben thinks Soft-Ice is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Ben enjoys hacking the shit out of any program he thinks is inefficient. Ben, being Type A, loves these things because they give him challenge and reward him with knowledge. (Ben was the type of kid who was more interested in taking his toys apart, figuring out how they worked, and then putting them back together than actually playing with them.)

Ben has a strong mischievous bent. This may be partly due to the fact that he enjoys knocking down barriers. Right when someone starts to think that they're "the shit," Ben will try to completely pop their swollen ego-bubble. Lack of modesty in certain things is not something Ben considers good. (Call this contradictory and hypocritical if you like.) Ben's humor reflects this trait very strongly. He avidly follows the literature of groups like The Cult of the Dead Cow and The Discordians. (Slogan: "We're not really esoteric, it's just that nobody usually understands what we say.") Ben has been seen with Sub-Genii on occasion. Ben likes the band Ween. Ben finds M. C. Escher fascinating. Paradoxical, ironic and absurd humor are the kinds that Ben enjoys the most.

Ben will snarf sushi on a moment's notice, and would like to learn kendo (and some of kenjutsu and iaido and iaijutsu, too) someday. He knows it's silly to idolize a culture that has so many flaws, but Ben likes Japan. He thinks he might be able to learn something from foreign cultures that he would never be able to learn from exposure to American culture. Ben went to Anime America '94, and also to Anime Expo and Anime America '95. Ben drove from Colorado to California and back to attend AE and AX '95.

Ben knows he is a hopeless computer geek, and should get out more. Ben enjoys The Dark Horse bar in Boulder, where you can get the best jalapeno and avocado burger in town and listen to the tunes of the live band, if there is one that night. And hopefully, someday, Ben will "have a life" and meet someone compatible. Until then... well, Ben will have to content himself with casual conversations with the multitude of killer babes that Boulder seems to always have around.

Ben's grandfather, who composes classical music, would probably scream if he knew what kind of music Ben likes. Ben likes everything from The Beastie Boys, to Nine Inch Nails, to J-POP, to Janet Jackson's old album 'Rhythm Nation', to Metallica and MegaDeath, to Lords of Acid, to Tom Petty, to U2, to Aerosmith, to... I could go on, but it would be faster to just say this: Just about the only kind of music Ben doesn't like is Country.

Part of being a Type A person is also being an adrenaline junkie. And Ben can be so, at times. But more than that, Ben has a great gusto for living. As Warren Zevon says, "I'd rather feel bad than feel nothin' at all." I'll sometimes do things that most people think are nuts, and most of the time I come out unscathed. When asked "WHY?", I often shrug and say "Because I wanted to know if I could" or "Why not?" Maybe you'll understand better if you read this philosophical thought inspired by a motorcycle wreck. It reflects one of the cornerstones of my philosophy, which is if you're not learning, growing, pushing the limits in some way or another, then you're stuck in a rut and are existing, but not living.

Ani-bot note: The above has been painstakingly (with the emphasis on pain :) edited from Mr. Cantrick's personal page.