Photo Credit: Huey2006 on FlickrSo today Sparky left for an extended trip west. Not only will we (me, Kurt, Baloo and Fionn) miss her, her comments and her insights, I will also miss her help. She is really the one who keeps this household running while Kurt builds the Mercantile and I run around like a, uh, crazy woman with no impulse control or a to-do list. By the time I had one brief meeting with Innkeeper Amy and washed the dishes, it was 3:00 p.m. So I gave up, and went surfing on Facebook.
I don't really like Facebook. It seems vaguely creepy, and voyeuristic, and kind of, well, icky. Why not just email your friends directly, or better yet, call them? Or if they are here at Dancing Rabbit, how about walking 20 yards for a face-to-face? I feel like I shouldn't be reading the comments to posts - shouldn't they be private? Facebook offends my delicate sensibilities.
But I'm hooked. I can't stay away. Like watching a train wreck or an interpersonal mediation gone horribly awry, I keep peeking between the fingers covering my eyes. And after reading several of the (very cleverly done) "25 Things" by friends, I decided to try it myself. Way back at the back of the curve (the New York Times did a story on 2/4) I am leaping in just as the wave is leaving the shore for parts unknown.
So, without further ado, 25 oh-so-fascinating Random Things about Moi.
1. My parents met at a club for tall people called Golden Gate Tip Toppers. Really. He was 7' tall, she was 6'.
2. During my childhood we had a standard poodle, and the kitchen counters were 3” higher than “normal.” That made everyone and everything in our house tall.
3. The first concert I attended was John Denver at the San Francisco Civic Auditorium in 1973. I was 16 and it was far-out, man.
4. I used to think I didn’t like cats much until one adopted me.
5. I am messy but love to be able to find things – a puzzling dichotomy. This leads us to…
6. My favorite quote is from A.A. Milne: “One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries.” For example, when money falls out of my pockets, I just leave it there as a fun surprise for myself when I (eventually) vacuum.
7. I have my own special brand of interpretive dance. If it were ever taken seriously, I would be horrified.
8. When I turned 12 (in 1969) I asked for the Beatles White Album and “Hair.” As I had been thinking about the songs “Rocky Raccoon” and “Oh Bla Di Bla Da” I was rather surprised by John Lennon’s growling rendition of “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road.” Additionally, expecting the sunny, wholesome Cowsills, I received instead the Broadway Cast Recording of “Hair.” I was briefly stunned (and dictionary-bound) with songs like “Sodomy.” My adolescence had officially begun!
9. I have backpacked all over the Sierra Nevada mountains – some of my favorite places are in John Muir Wilderness and near Clair Tappan Lodge, where Kurt and I met.
10. I am from the San Francisco Bay Area. Don’t call it “Frisco.’
11. I grew up in a tract home built in the 50’s. There were 4 different models – if you’d been in one of each, you pretty much knew what everyone else’s house looked like inside. I always wanted a house with stairs and dormers.
12. I love to speak in microphones, whether or not I have anything to say.
13. I enjoy stupid jokes, especially knock-knock jokes and bad puns.
14. I love to read. LOVE. TO. READ. Since January 1, 2009 I have read 11 books (this is in my “spare” time). Best this year: the lyrical and lovely “The Solace of Leaving Early” by Haven Kimmel.
15. I often pretend to speak French. This only works if no one else in the vicinity can actually speak it.
16. Words like odious, anemone, bilious, discombobulate, ennui, futilitarian, jejune and lugubrious make me happy, although I seldom use them.
17. Indecisiveness makes me stark raving mad. Just do something already!
18. During the huge (1989) San Francisco Loma Prieta earthquake, I was in the bathroom at work and thought it was simply a plumbing problem. This may have been taking “blasé Native Californian” a bit too far.
19. I have never, ever, ever, been bored.
20. I am and ENFP (Meyers Briggs Personality Indicator), an Orange brain (Sheila Glaznov’s What Color is Your Briain), a Cancer/Gemini cusp, and a 7 in the Enneagram (“Sevens are playful, high-spirited, and practical, they can also misapply their many talents, becoming over-extended, scattered, and undisciplined. They constantly seek new and exciting experiences, but can become distracted and exhausted by staying on the go. They typically have problems with impatience and impulsiveness.”) Hmmmmm...
21. Men who I will happily watch read or sing the phone book: David Straithairn, Lyle Lovett, Ed Harris, Samuel L. Jackson, Tommy Lee Jones, Sean Connery, the late Richard Farnsworth , Don Cheadle, William H. Macy, Kurt Kessner and Hugh “love those abs” Jackman.
22. I am a terrible traveler (i.e.: cranky, whiny, twitchy and generally quite horrible) – Kurt has promised that we can go anywhere in the world, as long as he can just meet me there.
23. My (private) Life List is about ¾ complete.
24. I really enjoy being 51, in spite of the thighs, and am quite delighted with where my life has taken me.
25. I love Brussels sprouts, sour cream, gorgonzola cheese, pain au chocolat, tarte tatin and Dr. Pepper. But not together.
Bonus Facts:
26. I am a part of a Green Mom's Blog Carnival even though I am not really a "mom." However, I believe that "Mother Earth" counts. We just won a Shorty award for best green content on Twitter. Go us!
27. I am an orphan. I am simultaneously relieved, saddened, lonely and apathetic about this status.
28. I have three of the most fabulous nieces ever. Look out world, the Anderson girls are coming.
29. Sometimes I get really, really tired of launching an ethical green business. I have a secret desire to chuck it all, buy a Hummer, sell items made in China by slave children, and eat non-organic, trans-fat laden, plastic-wrapped junk food. But then I come to my senses.
30. In case you didn't know, I live in an all off-grid, strawbale house, where we collect rainwater for cooking and bathing. However, I hardly ever sing Kumbya.
31. Our house has phones; DSL; two laptops; a microwave, a convection and a conventional gas oven; running water, 2 sinks, a big luxurious bathtub and a shower, a studio for me and an office for Kurt, lots of compact florescent lightbulbs, one dog and a cat (who masquerade as a herd of elephants).
