Finally, 100 Things About Me

I know I'm kind of late to this party, but what the heck:

1. Every time I see a bottle of calamine lotion, the song "Poison Ivy" gets stuck in my mind.
2. Every time I fly, during takeoff the song "Keep Their Heads Ringin'" gets stuck in my mind. (In the video, they steal a plane.)
3. I love the show Everybody Loves Raymond.
4. I am the biggest misocapnist you know. I guarantee it.
5. Sometimes, when my feet feel really good and I feel good all over (my feet have to feel good in order for this to happen), I think that if other people could experience how good it feels to be me, they'd never want to be themselves again.
6. I drive a 1998 Honda Civic with the following stickers: Keep Abortion Legal, a Lucinda Williams World Without Tears sticker, and a Kasey Chambers The Captain sticker.
7. I lived with my parents until I was 24 years old.
8. The biggest regret of my life is caving in to family pressure and going to college in my hometown rather than going away.
9. Some of the celebrities I have crushes on are Tobey Maguire, Wes Bentley, Hyde from That 70s Show, and Matt Damon, and I do not find Brad Pitt the least bit attractive.
10. My favorite band is The Ramones. I never got the opportunity to see them live.
11. I often look at other women's upper arms and stomachs and think, "Her upper arms are thinner than mine." "Her stomach is flatter than mine."
12. I was class president my sophomore year and junior year of high school, and decided not to run my senior year--I wanted to be editor-in-chief of the yearbook instead.
13. When brushing my teeth, I use very hot water. It seems cleaner.
14. I recently started a diet. It's simple: No calorie-containing beverages except coffee with cream & sugar in the morning. The rest of the day, it's herbal tea and water only. Also, I don't eat after 6:00 or 7:00 p.m., and sometimes, before a meal, I drink a lot of water and eat two Metamucil wafers. Psyllium fiber is good for you, and it expands in your stomach, lessening hunger.
15. I doubt I will ever get married or have children.
16. My cholesterol is high, hence the diet.
17. I want to go to a Star Trek convention.
18. I have always had insomnia, ever since I was a child. I'm looking into getting acupuncture for it.
19. My mother and my mother's mother are breast cancer survivors.
20. My favorite color is red.
21. In my right ear, I only have about 60-70% hearing. I always had ear problems as a child--lots of tympanoplasties. My hammer, anvil, and stirrup bones (in the middle ear) are prosthetic.
22. Technically, I know how to swim, but I can only doggie-paddle.
23. I have very long fingers. People used to tell me I'd be good at piano. I took piano lessons for a while, but sucked at it.
24. I prefer movies and TV to music.
25. I still love all my exes. When I'm in a relationship with someone, at some point a kind of suturing happens, where I think, I will always love this person, no matter what happens between us. It's not a let's-get-back-together kind of love, more like an overall benevolence.
26. My first semester teaching first-year composition was an absolute nightmare. The students talked during class all the time, wore their headphones, and read the newspaper. It took me some time to get that authority thing down.
27. I have never traveled abroad, unless you count Canada.
28. I paint my toenails, but never my fingernails.
29. I'm always hot, even when other people are cold.
30. I hate creamy soups and creamy sauces. I get grossed out by dairy products a lot, especially milk.
31. I like my peanut butter extra crunchy.
32. I'm from Alabama, and I get upset when people bad-mouth the South, especially if they haven't lived there. Yee-haw! Play some Skynyrd!
33. When I was in college, I used to go to clubs wearing a viking helmet and all kinds of other strange get-ups--old hideous prom dresses found in thrift stores, etc.
34. I used to be insanely jealous in my relationships. I'm much less so now.
35. The other day, I crossed a picket line for the first time and cried.
36. I am a Christian, but in a complicated non-fundamentalist kind of way.
37. I am an only child, and growing up, I was terribly lonely. Now I'm okay with the fact that I don't have siblings.
38. I'm not a sports fan, but basketball and hockey are okay.
39. I love New Orleans.
40. My favorite flower is a peach-colored rose.
41. I'm a little bit superstitious. I pick up pennies that are heads-up, make a wish when I pull out an eyelash, etc.
42. Celebrities I've met include George "Goober" Lindsey, G. Love, the drummer of No Doubt, two members of Fishbone, and Gloria Steinem.
43. I have never taken out a student loan.
44. When I was sixteen, I had a car wreck and broke my pelvis in five places.
45. Until my late teens, I could eat eggs, bacon, grits, biscuits, hashbrowns, and pancakes at 2:00 in the morning if I wanted and still weigh 103 pounds. I'd like that kind of metabolism again. Alas, it is not to be.
46. Ideologically, I am an environmentalist, but I'm decidedly NOT outdoorsy.
47. I hope there is intelligent life on other planets, and if that's the case, I would love to meet intelligent alien species in my lifetime.
48. I'd also like to travel to other planets. Sometimes I go to other planets in my dreams.
49. My dad was always reading to me when I was a child. Most of the time, it was your standard Little Golden Books and other children's books, but he also read me Cosmos by Carl Sagan. I loved the pictures and my dad's explanations of things like black holes and red dwarfs.
50. I have the worst luck when it comes to flashlights. Put one in my hand and the batteries will go dead immediately.
51. I'm good at remembering people's names, birthdays, anniversaries, etc.
52. My friends, especially my friends who don't live close by, don't call or email me as much as I call or email them. I used to resent it. Now I have come to appreciate my role as a nurturer of friendships. I think being an only child makes me place more value on friendships.
53. If I can get anything I want on a pizza, I get pepperoni, tomatoes, jalapenos, and banana peppers.
54. In the 1992 election, I voted for Bush the First. Thank God for deprogramming.
55. I minored in photography in college. I rarely shoot photographs anymore, but I still entertain the idea of doing photography as a career someday.
56. It would be cool to have a job where I had the opportunity to teach writing, photography, AND women's studies.
57. I think just about everything in this society is too privatized, including education, knowledge and culture (hello Disney!), and health care.
58. I have never held, much less shot, a gun.
59. I have no sense of direction whatsoever.
60. My favorite sandwich from Subway is a red wine vinaigrette club.
61. I should read the news more often.
62. I still have a videotape of hair band videos I made when I was in eighth grade--Headbangers' Ball when Adam Curry was the host. I still watch it occasionally.
63. I need to work on writing literature reviews; I'm still not very good at it.
64. I rarely cook. I know how, but I just don't enjoy it.
65. I cut tomatoes in wedges, not slices.
66. When I'm depressed, I play some happy music like "Let Me Blow Your Mind" by Eve or "Head Over Heels" by the Go-Gos and dance in my room.
67. I use one of those toothpaste tube flatteners.
68. I wish I enjoyed exercise.
69. I care A LOT about my students.
70. I like woodsy, herbal, floral, and spicy fragrances more than fruity ones.
71. My paternal grandmother died of a stroke when I was 19.
72. My maternal grandfather had Alzheimer's for many years and died when I was in my 20s.
73. My favorite poets are John Keats, Anne Sexton, and Paul Laurence Dunbar.
74. People say I'm too trusting.
75. People also say I have a very good memory.
76. I have an intense appreciation for comedy. Some of my favorite comics are Amy Sedaris, David Sedaris, Chris Rock, Jerry Seinfeld, Wanda Sykes, and Jennifer Saunders.
77. I relax by watching The Simpsons, King of the Hill, Blind Date, and The 5th Wheel.
78. I am both fascinated and repulsed by the idea of alpha males and alpha females. I see this little drama being played out all the time, though.
79. I pay my bills as soon as I get them in the mail.
80. I like reading theory.
81. My two biggest fears are running over someone, especially a child, with my car, and looking out the window and seeing some scary person or monster looking back in at me.
82. I've never had any desire to drive cross-country.
83. I've never had any desire to live "out west"--Colorado, California, whatever.
84. I like amusement parks.
85. At the Minnesota State Fair a few months ago, I had a deep-fried Snickers bar and thought it was divine.
86. I've never dived (scuba-dived or off a diving board).
87. I didn't realize until I was in graduate school how much I love playing softball (at the U of Tennessee, we played intramural softball).
88. I also like to shoot hoops. Not play basketball, just shoot hoops.
89. I was a nerdy child who wore a big retainer-like mouth appliance called a bionator. The other kids made fun of me because I had an unusual name, was nerdy, and they said I was ugly (I wasn't, but children can be so cruel yadda yadda). But when they needed help with school work, they would practically prostrate themselves for me.
90. I think the world would be a better place without people. When I first read Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence, I found myself in agreement with a lot that Rupert Birkin was saying--well, except the misogyny.
91. People tell me my southern accent is fading. I'm sad about that.
92. I'm a huge procrastinator.
93. I think there is too much infighting within the women's movement.
94. I had terrible acne for twelve years until I took Accutane in the spring of 1998.
95. I think the grossest thing in the world is when someone smokes a cigarette and drinks a glass of milk at the same time.
96. My dad used to make up stories to tell me. They were always set on the bank of Cypress Creek, which was in the subdivision where we lived. The main characters were Billy Beaver and Clancy Ann Rabbit.
97. As a child, I used to pick up frogs and kiss them to see if they would turn into princes.
98. There's a lot about me that I don't say here on my blog, a lot I'm afraid to say.
99. The best teacher I've ever had is Lisa Minor at the University of North Alabama.
100. I'm aware of the irony in my saying the best teacher I've ever had was at UNA, while simultaneously I regret having gone to college in my hometown. As I get older, I play that "If this hadn't happened to me, that wouldn't have happened" game more often.
101. I take great pleasure in refilling things, like salt shakers and liquid hand soap dispensers.