Hey ya – my name’s Michael Tirado.  The most important thing about me is probably my music…in my opinion, anyway.  I was born in Brooklyn and lived in Bay Ridge for the first year of my life – my parents decided they wanted to raise me somewhere with more space, so we moved to Staten Island (which seems to be everybody’s least favorite borough).  For the most part I’ve enjoyed living in Dongan Hills up the street from a beach, and by that I mean take away the occasional flooding and Hurricane Sandy, and I largely prefer the casual suburbs to the uncomfortable city.  I still dorm four days a week, though.  I’m Puerto Rican and a quarter Italian, but my family is as American as a family gets.  Even my paternal Puerto Rican grandpa walked around looking like Elvis Presley’s look-alike because he loved the music so much, and my maternal Puerto Rican grandma loved American tv shows like I love Lucy, etc.  There has been extremely little presence of my original heritage in my immediate or extended family, only two members speak Spanish.  For this reason I’m interested in learning about Puerto Rican immigration (even though people from Puerto Rico are technically not immigrants).  The Hispanic kind of shows up, though…I’ve got curly hair and rhythm, and no food is too spicy.