Have you ever wondered what I’d be like if I were a little taller, a little more savvy with numbers and computers, a little bit of a better listener, slightly less funny, a year older and male? No?

Meet Charles King.

What is your first and last name?
Charles and King, respectively.

I understand you’re “almost vegan.” How long have you been an almost compassionate eater?
I think you misunderstand. I’m a vegetarian who is taking tiny steps toward veganism, but I wouldn’t consider that “almost vegan.” In fact, I still kill insects and spiders when I see them in my house. I started a roughly 90 day “30 Days of Vegetarianism” experiment in mid 2008, but officially became a vegetarian in June of 2011.

Have you always been close-but-no-cigar?
Have you always enjoyed pointing out my shortcomings?

What is standing in your way of being vegan?
To put it plainly, my desire to be vegan has not (yet?) grown large enough to outweigh my desire to eat sweets, to avoid asking for special meals in restaurants, and to be able to find something to eat at other people’s houses.

I tried eating eggs once and I got sick. Don’t you get sick?
I rarely get sick when I eat animal products. For example, I recently ate some Doritos only to find out later that they had chicken powder in them. The only pain I felt was a pang of astonishing disbelief when I learned I live in a society that puts meat in its tortilla chips. Why isn’t the opposite happening? I’d like to see someone try to serve cheeseburgers stuffed with green beans as though it was normal. I digress. Usually any stomach ailment is the direct result of a lack of water and a surplus of nuts or fruits.

Non-vegans are always telling everyone about their food and their lack of morals. What’s that about?
Omnivores have very strong jaw muscles due to all the flesh-chewing they do. In order to relieve the lactic acid building up in those jaws, they have to exercise them. Combine that with their desire to drown out the sound of animals crying out in pain, the natural course of action is for them to move their mouths and emit sounds. (Ha! That was funny right? Am I doing well?)

Do you eat fish? You eat fish, right?
I don’t eat fish. There were only a couple of years in my life that I enjoyed fish. And by fish, I mean salmon.

Are there any animals in your life, such as pets or funny neighborhood squirrels? Tell us a story about them.
I don’t have any pets. There are plenty of birds, squirrels, and other animals that run around in my backyard but they haven’t yet produced stories worth telling. They spend too much time focused on gathering food for survival rather than providing comical entertainment.

What do you do for fun besides funding animal cruelty?
As a huge nerd, I enjoy spending time developing software, talking about developing software, and reading about developing software. I also play a lot of board games. Maybe if I ate meat then I’d have cooler, more physically demanding hobbies.

Did you know that Miley Cyrus is a non-vegan? Do you really want to emulate her?
Did you know Miley Cyrus voiced the Mudka’s Meat Hut Waitress on the TV show The Emperor’s New School?

Do you have any upcoming projects you want to plug, work related or otherwise?
No, I’ll leave the shameless self promoting to another member of my family! (Boom!)

Who is your favorite vegan sister?
Probably Erykah Badu. Or maybe Brandy Norwood or Angela Bassett. Oh, I almost forgot about Tia Mowry though. This is too hard. I can’t decide. (Again, boom!)

Make up a question of your own and answer it.
Is it hard dealing with meals when your spouse isn’t a vegetarian?
No, my wife is incredibly supportive of my dietary choices. In fact, if it wasn’t for her, I’d have withered away on a strict intake of cereal and frozen pizzas.

Song: Cage the Elephant – Tiny Little Robots
Recipe: Black Bean Burgers (I tried so hard to find a burger with green beans in it!)