25 Random Things about me

I lifted the whole intro from Frank Maier's, so if it's not true that you don't tag, delete that part.

Before you read my revelations, here are the rules:

Once you've been tagged, write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about yourself. When you're done, tag 25 people, plus the person who tagged you. To do this as a Facebook note, go to "notes" under tabs on your profile page, paste these instructions at the beginning, type your 25 random things, and then tag 25 people.

Anyone who knows me knows that I don't tag, so we're just ignoring that part of this little exercise. Here are 25 random brainfarts from me.

I did this a few years back, but I want to try to share newer things.

1. When someone asked me if I had a copy of my book online, I thought he meant The Big Book of Unschooling, or Moving a Puddle. He meant Bright Ideas and True Confessions, an SCA handbook I wrote years ago. (I told him it was, but the format is inconsistent, it's not downloadable (except in its individual bits), and I'll look for a paper copy, but for any SCA folk with the same question, here.

2. I'm pretty sure I will never catch up with filing important papers and photos, or putting things on my webpages I want to put there, or editing Bright Ideas. So I'm glad I finished the other two books.

3. I thought when my first child moved out that I would miss him terribly, but I didn't. I wondered whether to feel guilty, but I think it's that he seems so whole and confident, and that he was ready to go, and he was moving toward something, not away-from-us-to-get-away. I enjoyed seeing him settle in and be happy about new friends and a new place. I love to see him when I do, though, and will see him Monday.

4. I went to India thinking "just this once," even though I had heard my whole life that anyone who goes to India once will go back. I DO have a growing list of what I will would do "next time."

5. I like to do two things at one time, but if I can do three or four, I feel POWERFUL. I listen to a book from audible.com while I sew, while the laundry is running, and I feel like I'm in a soft nest made of clouds. Or I watch a movie while I play a video game and heat the hot tub. That's nice too.

6. I develop an attachment to things. Toys. Books. Metal storage cans. My hatchet. A certain pair of scissors I got at the flea market, with a matching letter opener, that was an advertising gift probably before I was born. I'm a packrat with great affection for things.

7. My floors aren't clean because I don't like to clean floors and I don't know why. I cleaned two the other day, which is what's making me think of my aversion.

8. My dishes are clean because it would be disgusting not to have clean dishes. I scrub the outsides of pans and skillets. (Somehow dirty floors don't come under "disgusting" on my scale of good-to-bad.)

9. I love to wear jeans because of the pockets.

10. I'm a lot like my dad's mom, in many visible and invisible ways. Personality, temperament, habits, and some physical things. She was a packrat too. My parents were not.

11. I'm more afraid of long car rides than of airplanes. Not sure why. (I'm not afraid of airplanes.)

12. I've had waist-length hair except for four haircuts, after each of which it grew back to waist length (sometimes a little longer). It's gotten thinner, though, for sure. It was cut in 6th grade, on a road trip with a female friend (I got it cut in Virginia, just to do it—shoulder length, later shortened a bit more), when I broke my leg and wasn't going to be able to take care of it, and then when Keith cut his own waist-length hair off to get an engineering job, I had my already-short hair buzz-cut in the back and spiked on top by the same hairdresser, so Keith's hair could still be longer than mine, but I don't have a photo of that. BUMMER.

13. I like shelves, and think it's like vandalism when realtors want homeowners to take out all the shelves so a house "can sell." Some people would pay much extra for a house full of shelves!!

14. I like Miracle Whip better than mayonnaise most of the time, and I would like for those who make rude noises about that to shut the f**k up. It is SO not a big deal, and I've never tried to make anyone else eat Miracle Whip.

15. England (physically, not politically) is heaven to me. I love the *stuff.*


16. I'm not always proud to be an American, but I'm proud of New Mexico and the U.K. is unlikely to annex it. I'm accustomed to being an American, after 57 years, but sometimes it's embarrassing.

17. I think I might choke on my own saliva and die someday. I'll start choking without even having food in me, so if I'm ever like visiting your house and I just start coughing and I die, please don't feel bad.

18. I remember tunes really well, and can harmonize, but I forget the rules to easy card games like hearts and spades. I have to get a review each time. Lame. (Same with Renaissance and country dances... I need a review as though it were a card game. But if I'm one of the musicians, and someone plays a few notes of a song, I know it, and can do melody or harmony....)

19. When I was a young teen, I used to pray and cry because my parents were going to go to hell. I knew that because I went to church a lot, and they didn't.

20. Driving for long distances makes me sleepy, and so I have a limited range.

21. I make a game of playing the piano. I'll find a piece I like, and kind of know, and play it until I've made three mistakes and then quit. "Game over." It's stress reduction, sometimes. Or if I feel like "cheating," I'll just play as long as I want to. And make as many mistakes as I do, without feeling bad. So there. [I like baroque stuff. Clementi. Bach. Good, clockwork video-game stuff. I don't play piano by ear, though I can play a melody line by ear, and then write out the notation if someone needs me to, but... piano is not "my instrument."]

22. I play Plants vs. Zombies.


23. I can sew, with or without patterns. I wish I were really good at embroidery, but I'm impatient, inconsistent, and I don't have the color-and-pattern sense to design cool individual designs, and I don't want to use patterns, so my perfectionism freezes me up in the embroidery area.

24. I had no idea how much I would enjoy being a mother. I wasn't a babysitting girl when I was growing up. I wasn't a "oh, what a beautiful baby" person when I was a teen and young adult. When Kirby was born and my hormones kicked in, though, it all changed.

25. I love Christmas, but this year we have no tree, and I didn't mail cards, and didn't do stockings for the kids. I was just really busy with other things, and they're grown, and they didn't mind.

But NEXT year, I have marked December as do NOTHING but put up a tree, do good stockings, mail Christmas cards. Nothing else. Except maybe get ready for a little Santa Fe gathering or something.

---

And.... #26, maybe.
I have a blog called Just Add Light and Stir that I like a lot, and it's "e-mail subscribeable."