- Name, job title, and location: Peter Hanssen, Senior E-Resources Specialist, Lauinger Library.
- What do you do—in 10 words or less? Make electronic resources accessible when they don’t want to be.
- Where are you from? I grew up in Colorado on the Front Range.
- Do you have any hobbies? I have a few, but the two that get most of my attention are cooking and real-time strategy games.
- What are you reading/watching/playing/listening to/learning right now? Reading: Obelisk: A History, about the ongoing three-millennium story of Egyptian obelisks. Watching: the AfreecaTV StarLeague, which is the premier professional 1v1 tournament for Blizzard Entertainment’s StarCraft.
- What are your favorite things about spring? Warmer weather and more daylight are my favorite things. I can’t wait for the Earth to come back to life, though it might have already happened by the time this is published.
- If you could have a ticket to any place or event, what would it be and why? A ticket to the island of Corfu! I re-read Gerald Durrell’s memoir every few years, and he makes it sound utterly magical. Someday, I’ll take a whole month and go see it.
- What’s your favorite quote? The inscription on the Temple of Saturn, in Rome, translates to: “The Senate and the People of Rome restored what was consumed by fire.” The temple had burned in the year 360 CE and was rebuilt with that inscription. It’s an inspiring message of endurance and resilience, like a Rocky Balboa quote, except this one predates him by 1600 years.
- What couldn't you live without? Gruyere cheese. It’s especially good melted. I made a baked macaroni and cheese that was about 60% cheese, most of it gruyere, and now it’s all I want to eat.
- Is there anything from the past you wish would come back into fashion? I want metal toggle switches to come back. It’s really satisfying to use heavy, mechanical switches, knobs, buttons, any input control that clicks into place loudly and solidly when you activate it. They used to be on everything. I have a clacky mechanical keyboard at home, and it is a dream to type on.