Paul Betney is perpetually in motion. It's the first thing that everyone notices about him. To put it bluntly, he shakes. Sometimes he looks like he's going to rattle himself apart, but then he arches his eyebrows and says, "Can you imagine me at airports?" and the audience is in fits.
"Looking on the bright side, it's given me fantastic muscle toning," he says. "But only on one side. And I seem to spend a lot of time walking round in circles."
Betney, a 34-year-old from Liverpool -- famed in Britain for the sense of humor of its residents -- has lived in Japan for 11 years, earning a steady income teaching English, helping to produce a music magazine, traveling, picking up some of the language, putting down roots and generally living a comfortable and relatively carefree existence.