Nomad5

I am an expat Aussie living in Wisconsin, in the US. I have lived in and traveled to many countries around the world, and have always considered traveling to be one of my favourite things in life. I have always tried to drive through each country I visit to really experience life there.

My other interests are many and varied. I love being in the wild, and camping and kayaking are two of my favourite outdoor pursuits. I love sci-fi and fantasy in all forms. I'm passionate about good food and drink, and love to cook. One of my main hobbies is lapidary (cutting stones), although I don't do faceting, just cabochons.

I love animals, and my wife and I have three dogs, two cats, and a sun conure parrot. All of them were either rescues, or bought from poor situations.

Although I miss my beautiful native land, Wisconsin is now my home. It's a state that borders Canada, so is extremely cold in winter (-40° F last winter), but has beautiful, even quite warm summers. Spring is gorgeous here, as the plants seem to erupt over a period of a couple of weeks when the temperature reaches the critical point after winter. We go from bare sticks and mud, to lush trees and flowers everywhere seemingly overnight.

Wisconsin is famed for its dairy cattle and its love of beer, so beer and cheese are two of its biggest exports. Well actually, I'm not sure how much of the beer escapes to be honest...

The mighty Mississippi river runs through the west of the state, and we own 20 acres of old oak savannah forest out there, where we spend most weekends when the weather isn't too cold. We have many deer, wild turkey, raccoons, coyotes and other animals on our land, and many wildflowers and beautiful trees, including white and red oaks, elms, hickory, maple, cherry and ironwood, to name a few.

Anyway, I love to hear about other places, whether I've already visited or not. Feel free to give me a brief description of your favourite things/places in your country, or your thoughts on life there in general. These are the things I like to hear about.

Thanks in advance for writing. I hope you get many wonderful cards as well.

Cards I would like (not an exhaustive list, but to give you an idea...)

* Anything humorous
* Maps
* Oceans/Mountains/Deserts (anything wild)
* Unusual native animals
* Cultural symbols (anything special and unique to your culture)
* Architecture from your home country
* Food and/or wine
* Beautiful & unusual photography
* Anything scientific, especially cosmological
* Sci-fi or fantasy art (especially Royo, Elmore, Vallejo, Bell, Frazetta, Kaluta, and similar)
* Sherlock Holmes (original/early stuff)
* Classic pin-up art/Tasteful nudes (e.g. Olivia, Gil Elvgren, etc)
* Classic art (prefer renaissance)
* Anything humorous
or...
* Anything humorous

Things I'm not interested in include:

* Religious messages
* Motivational cliches
* General kitsch
* Advertising/commercial cards, unless vintage