36 Things You Don't Know About Me

A long time ago I saw where a blogger or two had celebrated her birthday by giving a list of "X Things You Don't Know About Me", where X equals the number of completed years since you were born. It is not my birthday, but, as I think it says on my profile I'm a Scorpio, it will be no surprise that my next birthday is soon. Soon I will no longer be able to claim I am in my mid-thirties. At thirty-seven you've pretty much made it to your late thirties, and even if you do keep saying mid-thirties you have only one more year to do it, because thirty-eight is definitely late thirties. So here's my list, before I have to add another item to it.

1. I have never gotten a traffic ticket. (But I have been pulled over--twice when I first started driving, once a couple of years ago; the first two were due more to excessive caution than youthful exuberance.)

2. Number of high school classes I deliberately failed: two.

3. Three is probably my favorite number. (For another candidate see below.)

4. The smell of fresh gardenias always seems pleasant to me at first whiff, but a moment later makes me feel faintly nauseated.

5. Secret shame: I actually like that old Bette Davis movie, Now, Voyager, and have seen it twice.

6. Gin and tonic is my favorite drink.

7. I have been known to utter the phrase "the hegemony of the American lawn" on multiple occasions. And always in rant mode.

8. I used to have a snake phobia, and I was cured of it in a dream.

9. My sister and I are always recognized as sisters and have even been mistaken for twins. We don't think we look alike.

10. I wear a size 10 shoe and a size 10 ring. But not a size 10 dress.

11. I have a charm bracelet and the charm I chose to represent my husband is a knight in shining (more or less) armor.

12. People who see me with Uncle Pookie and ask how long we have been married inevitably express surprise at the answer--twelve years in December; apparently we talk to each other too much and hold hands too often to look like the bitter old married people we are.

13. I find Benny Hill hilarious.

14. I prefer to carry a golf umbrella, rather than a normal or small one.

15. I don't like to wear pants, skirts, or dresses without pockets; it seems the older I get the more annoying it becomes to have to carry a purse.

16. I always put my keys in my right pocket and my wallet in my left pocket, on the grounds that I need ready access to my keys but it's not a bad idea to have it take a moment to get to my money.

17. In my early teens, when I read about boys and girls carrying books differently, I immediately began carrying mine like a boy. I have made other, occasional experiments with using "male" body language.

18. I think the so-called white chocolate is an abomination before God. (Okay, not really, but it is foul and unnatural.)

19. I joined Mensa twice and let my membership lapse both times.

20. My favorite of the "big three" haijin (haiku poets), Basho, Buson, and Issa, is probably Issa; Basho might be the best, but I feel much closer to Issa.

21. I feel sorry for every ugly dog I see and part of me wants to adopt nearly every one.

22. I'm the only non-gamer I know who refers to a normal die as a D6--this is from hanging out with a gamer for, let's see, sixteen years now.

23. If we leave out desserts that involve chocolate, the most delicious dessert I've ever had was sweet potato cobbler. It's something my mother bought from a local woman a few times when I was a teenager. I've never encountered it anywhere else, but it trumped even cheesecake, which is my top dessert nowadays.

24. I love the smell of almond flavoring so much I've considered wearing it as cologne.

25. I was prone to carsickness as a child, and every once in a while now I will get a faint touch of it--or every few years a full blown case of it. It's not pleasant or something I would want to pass on to a child, but on the plus side, I threw up so much as a child I can do it without pain and with only minimal discomfort; I figure vomiting comes up more often in most lives than any astronaut-type activities which the motionsickness rules out, so I'm ahead. (Yes, that nasty pun was intended.)

26. I try to keep crystallised ginger in my glove compartment for nausea, but I find I want a sweet-with-bite taste far more often than I get nauseated.

27. I am unaccountably fond of the number twenty-seven.

28. I am blessed with an excellent digestive system, which I have abused mightily for over thirty years.

29. I used to be able to read French well enough to enjoy French haiku online, but these days I'm doing good to remember what Parlez-vous anglais? means.

30. I have a St. Martin de Porres medal on my keyring, which is a simply designed Bacardi Limon freebie; I have never actually tasted Bacardi Limon.

31. I was baptized on the Pentecost vigil (i.e. the eve of the Feast of Pentecost). Coincidentally, I was recently asked if I'm a Pentecostal, which surprised, then amused me. I guess it was because my hair, which could now be considered waist-length, was hair-sticked into a huge bun, and I appeared to have no makeup on.

32. I ascribe to the "if somebody compliments your makeup, it's no compliment" school of thought, at least in most situations. But I did have some fun with dramatic, '80s style eye makeup back in the '80s.

33. Like Gilda Radner, I base most of my fashion sense on what doesn't itch--also, what doesn't cause pain or more than very minor discomfort. So no pointy-toed shoes, no tight clothes, and no eyebrow plucking. I'm also anti-excruciating boredom, so no tanning and no endless filing, buffing, and painting of my fingernails.

34. I sing very badly, but I enjoy singing, especially filk and novelty sing-a-long type songs; I know all the words to quite a few songs like "I Shot Bambi's Mother" and "The Scotsman".

35. What's in my car CD player: Aaron Neville's Believe. Near Christmas I like to put in a Handel CD I have, that includes extensive selections from his Messiah.

36. I've seen every Ranma 1/2 TV show and OAV, and the Ranma 1/2 movie.

If 36 items just isn't enough Auntie Suzanne for you (which I find very hard to believe), try this list. Oh, and BTW, my mentioning I'm a Scorpio should not be taken as an endorsement of astrology; besides the fact that astrology is a pseudo-science, divination is forbidden to Jews and Christians and so as a Catholic I usually try to avoid even the appearance of it. But that doesn't change the fact that I can remember things I picked up years ago or the fact that, if you give Blogger your birthdate, it enters the astrological signs in your profile automatically. It also doesn't mean I don't still smile at certain jokes, such as, Q: How many Scorpios does it take to change a lightbulb? A: Why change it? We LIKE the dark.

[Edited a few entries 10/28/06, but I'm confident I left in enough typos, questionable grammar, and rambling to leave it obvious I needed sleep when I wrote this.]