I've been tagged by the lovely Winter and am most happy to comply with her request to know 5 weird things about me. As she noted, weirdness is subjective. What I consider weird, others might consider repulsive, obsessive compulsive or merely embarassing. History will decide.
- I'm intensely pyrophobic. That, in itself, is not weird. When discussing fave ways to die, no one I know chimes in with: "Hey, that's how I'd like to go when my time comes - trapped in a raging inferno!" But I am always slightly hysterical around fire of any kind. On the rare occasions I'm near a campfire, I'm the one who gets the bucket of water when we're done. Candles - romantic, sure, but ARE THEY SAFE? I did not light a match unassisted until I was 22 and I only lit it because I was in a show and I HAD to. I can only hope the audience thought my hand tremors were a character choice. This afternoon, when our Jiffypop set off the Screaming Klaxon of Death our building calls a smoke detector, Katr immediately turned on the fan, opened the windows and started to wave a magazine in the area around the smoke detector. I, on the other hand, made for the door and burst out into the hallway, hoping that my oven mitts would make up for my lack of actual pants. Fire - me no likey.
- When I play computer solitaire, I have to play until I win. And then, when I win, the King of Hearts card has to be the last card that I place on the deck. If I screw up and place the King of Hearts BEFORE another card, I have to start playing again. I don't play computer solitaire anymore.
- I don't like bending over unless I know something really fun is going to happen. This means that the top two drawers in my dresser are crammed to capacity and the bottom one is nearly empty. It also means that everything in our fridge is at the front of the shelf, with acres of empty space in the back. I fill the crisper drawers at the bottom of the fridge only under duress. Things go in but they don't come out. Well, a smell comes out. And then Katr cleans the drawers.
When I was a kid, there were certain vowel sounds that really bothered me, particular the "oo" sound, as in "moon" or "poo". And so, I refused to say those words. 'Cause GOD, I hated that sound. In fact, I kinda still do. Anyway, my brother and I went to this day camp for a week one summer when we were little and the jovial camp counsellor, who'd clearly just discovered Brit T.V., told us kids that if we wanted to go to the bathroom, we HAD to say "Alex, may I go to the loo?" Looking back, I'm sure that Alex was flexible on this rule, but I was not a child who asked a lot of questions. Instead, to avoid using the word "loo", I intentionally dehydrated myself in the morning before we left for day camp and then all hot summer day, even going so far as to give away my lunchtime juicebox, just so that I wouldn't have to pee. I have no doubt that my dislike of "oo" had a deleterious effect on my bladder. If I'm wearing Depends by the time I'm 40, I will blame Alex.
- I am a lesbian - who is allergic to cats and hates camping.
Und now, I tag others: ers, newyorkex, Melissa, Chezza - smoke 'em if ya got 'em. Noooo pressure.
Good times! Now that's done, I'll return to my exciting Saturday evening of knitting (not purling), watching Buffy on DVD and listening to my girlfriend in the other room playing the kicky campaign tune "Heureusement, ici le Bloc!", which she downloaded from the Bloc Quebecois website because she thinks Gilles Duceppe is hot.
