Coming out of the closet

Nosemonkey has revealed who he is, and leads me onto something that I touched on when John Band's site went down. It is a discussion about anonymity, and why we write under pseudonyms so often.

What this meant was that I could air my opinions, writing as me (I write as I think and speak; if you like my writing voice, you will probably get on with me), but not about me. Perhaps it's the romance of the pseudonym that I chose (although Devil's Kitchen has been a name associated with me in certain areas of Edinburgh for five or six years now) that helps to inspire, perhaps it's the encouragement from others. In whatever case, the pseudonym is part of the joy of the blog.

The second reason is far more practical, and serious. It is, of course, the trouble with bleed-over into real life, in which your opinions can be detrimental to your... well... pocket, frankly. If what you write about could get you sacked, if disagreeing with one of the nutcases who—inevitably—trawl the 'net can get you fired, then what you can say on your blog must be censured. And then what is the point of writing a blog? Surely the liberating thing about this exciting, new(ish) technology of ours is that you can say what you want and, as most do, invite others to disagree with you.

I think that these still hold true and whilst I would like to make some money out of my blog (Nosemonkey's main motivation for revealing himself), the desire to keep the personality of DK is stronger. This may not apply for ever (after all, Christmas is coming and we all know how poor one gets at Christmas), but just now I like being DK.

However, for those of you who might be interested, I shall aggregate some facts that have been mentioned on here before. It's a once-in-a-lifetime event, mind you! My real name is Christopher Mounsey, and I'm a 28 year old, Eton-educated Englishman (from Tonbridge, in Kent. Actually, the manager of Mr Worstall's most frequented pub, in Portugal, grew up about two streets away from me. Small world, eh?) who has lived in Edinburgh for the last nine years. I studied Microbiology at Edinburgh University for two years, but swiftly realised that I had signed up for another four years of A-Level when me tutor told me, in my first term, to "simply regurgitate what your lecturers tell you and you will pass the exams". I accidentally got into doing poster designs for the student theatre company, having joined as an actor, and when I dropped out I decided to get a job doing graphic design. Thus, I worked for a couple of small print and design houses for six years, before joining—and, stupidly, investing in—an internet design company. I took to coding immediately and, when the company went bust, I took the unfinished contracts and two of the guys and started up my own company at the prompting of the MD. And that's where I am now. I really love web coding, but find myself mainly dealing with print work and the inevitable paperwork, which is often fairly tedious. I am still involved in the theatre and, over the course of nine years, have acted in seventeen stage productions, directed five, teched two and produced or co-produced thirty-eight (thirty-nine and forty are coming up). One of those was done under the aegis of Devil's Kitchen Productions (named after the flat in which we used to meet), which then turned into a four person freelancing company called Devil's Kitchen Design: that lasted about a year and then we split, and I retained the name. Thus, Devil's Kitchen is a name that has been associated with me and my work for about 6 years. I drink (real ale) and smoke (Marlboro Red) far more than is good for me and resolutely fail to give a shit. I have a fairly pointed sense of humour and have been known to really upset people without realising. Finally, the picture to the right was taken during a photoshoot, for a production of The Dollshouse, in 1998; I have a few more lines now. The roses are plastic.

So, that's most of me. I'm going back to hide behind DK again now (and good luck to Nosemonkey in finding work)...