I'm Asa (/ˈeɪ.sʌ/). I have a website now!
CSS is left as an exercise for the browser.
I host the Isometry Group, a Mastodon server mostly for my friends. If you want an invite link to join it, ask me or anyone else who has an account.
I recently got a master's degree in math. My thesis was on something called "number theory", which sounds like a fake subject invented by someone who doesn't know anything about math. I'm told it is in fact real.
I'm interested in technical theatre, especially lighting technology and design. I've done lighting design at Tuesday Night Café, the McGill Savoy Society, and Home Theatre Productions, among others. I also helped found Accordion Theatre, where I produced its (and my) first show, in addition to doing the lighting design.
High-quality theatre lighting consoles are extremely expensive, even though the technology doesn't seem fundamentally too complicated. I once had some fun building a basic DMX controller using a few cheap electronic components and writing some very basic software for it. Someday I'd like to try expanding it to be useful for theatre design.
Most recently, I did the lighting design for the McGill Savoy Society's 2025 production of Iolanthe and for Regarding Antigone, an original Fringe show.
I'm also interested in organizational governance and democratic meeting procedure. I'm most familiar with Robert's Rules of Order, Newly Revised, but I also have some experience with the American Institute of Parliamentarians Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure and the CSN's rules of order, among others. I think all are seriously flawed but also that Robert's Rules in particular is widely misunderstood and underrated.
My interest is in how a group of people can build and maintain a culture around their written rules that allows them to shape their power relations deliberately and with intention. Because of this, I'm interested in organizations that don't have legal structures to rely on to enforce their rules for them, for example because their members don't have the resources or inclination to hire lawyers. This often means organizations with few or no paid staff, where the membership does most or all of the work, like many activist and student-run organizations and some labour unions.
I have served at AGSEM since 2023 as the elected chair of the large board, and often as a parliamentarian and appointed assembly chair. I've consulted on rules, meetings, and governance and served as a professional temporary presiding officer for a number of other organizations, including several student associations. I've drafted, revised, and reviewed bylaws and other rules; researched and answered questions on parliamentary procedure; and chaired meetings ranging from small boards to assemblies with hundreds of members, including one trial of an officer of an organization.
You can hire me for this! If my experience might be useful to you or an organization you're part of, send me a message! This is a source of much of my income right now, but I have done this sort of work for as little as free, for interesting problems at organizations with limited resources.
I have a camera! Sometimes I bring it to protests to photograph them. I also sometimes take pictures of my friends' cats. Here are some of my favourite cat pictures I've taken. My protest photos have been published in The McGill Daily and The Link.