10 - 20 Random Things

Okay . . . believe it or not, I have a Facebook page.

It was something I got into not but a few months ago as a consequence of my wife's Best Man (an old friend from as far back as the 2nd grade) starting his own Facebook page and inviting us to be "friends."

Well, low and behold, but don't I find that there are people on Facebook I actually know. And one of them recently initiated (or continued?) an interesting twist on the chain letters from the days when letters were actually written and mailed with stamps: 10 or 20 Random Things About Yourself forwarded to 20 random people on Facebook that you know. I suspect this is something dreamt up by someone with thousands of Facebook connections, some of whom about which they know absolutely nothing.

The concept is intriguing . . . tell a bunch of people things about yourself that you might never have told anyone else (ever!) in an effort to get to know them better. Because, in a perfect game, they are supposed to respond in kind.

I must admit that I was not sure where to start. Or even whether I should start. Or if I could start, and then finish. But once I got going, I really got into it. So, at the risk of repeating myself over multiple platforms, here are the 20 Random Things about myself:

1. My cat hates me; but then she hates everyone but my wife . . . and the cable guy . . . and . . .
2. I am the only person I know who has turned a $30 home tune-up into a $300+ radiator job; I am no longer allowed to work on cars.
3. I wanted to be a fireman when I was little; now I am a consultant.
4. I had a fringed fire-engine red nap rug in kindergarten; now I wish I could take naps at work. What ever happened to that rug?
5. I used to eat library paste and pour my pineapple-grapefruit juice down the drain when I thought the teacher wasn't looking. I remember the taste of both: one with some small delight and one with shudders of disgust. You guess . . .
6. I cut class once in summer school; I sneaked out the bathroom window at Mesa Elementary School in Los Alamos. I think I was between the 4th and 5th grade. I never did it again, until I first got to university; then I never even bothered to go to class.
7. I am a sucker for back-scratches . . . my "wings" itch all the time, but they itch most when someone touches them. Then, no amount of scratching satisfies me . . .
8. I would retire right now if I thought we could get me through a PhD program without going BUST.
9. I love to cook . . . I hate doing dishes . . . I am legendary for my ability to TOTAL a kitchen (and everything in it). Ask Lois Maggenti, my high school English teacher. Or our friends Glen and Linda.
10. I read lots of books, but my secret pleasure is reading PULPS. I loved reading Doc Savage books in high school; the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs and H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard still thrill me. H. Rider Haggard taught me that adventure stories could be cerebrally challenging. But, it took Joseph Conrad and Rudyard Kipling and Ernest Hemingway to convince me that they could be great literature. Even Shakespeare has his pulpy moments.
11. I suffer from "imposter's syndrome" whenever I attend and present papers at conferences, particularly literary conferences. I've been told that everyone does, even the experts. That is no comfort.
12. I have been teaching for the last 30 years and I still get somewhat anxious before walking into a classroom; even one full of students I know.
13. I like my coffee fresh ground, made in a French press, and served black. On weekends, I use a mug that used to belong to my father; it makes it even more special than it usually is.
14. While I love travel, I have come to truly hate being on the road and away from Laurie and home. But that is the lot of a consultant. I probably would not have been home any more often had I become a fireman, right?
15. Iowa really isn't such a bad place . . . if you like corn, and pork, and bitter cold winters, and hot humid summers. They are even considering making it illegal to use cell phones while driving (FINALLY!!), except for the police.
16. I am a Democrat, but then aren't we all in the literal sense of the word? I am also a Republican, in the literal sense of the word. The two are not mutually exclusive, except in the minds of certain inveterate fools. We all need to keep that in mind.
17. I am unbelieveably lucky! Inanimate objects continually conspire among themselves to do me in, yet I manage to get along with them. But, why can't I get along with my cat? Laurie would say it is because I can't stop "poking the bear." She's undoubtedly right.
18. I frequently use Google Maps to look at my childhood home town (Los Alamos, NM). I am able to pick out our house because my father did some landscaping which is unmistakably visible in the images.
19. I would love to leave a meaningful footprint that "visible."
20. I have no regrets . . . at least, none that I let keep me awake at night.

Feel free to respond with your own 10 or 20 Random things, here.