From the meme thing going on in Facebook. Once you have been tagged, write a note with 25 random things about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. Tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you it’s because I want to know more about you. (To do this, go to “Notes” under tabs on your profile page, paste these instructions in the body of the note, type your 25 random things, tag 25 people (in the right hand corner of the app then click publish..)
(FRIEND in Yellowknife, I would tag you in Facebook, but you are not there and prefer to remain known simply as THE FRIEND. You can join another one of my friends (Ludovic in Switzerland) who are members of the secret and private “I-am-not-a-member-of-Facebook” club.) Still, you can write your 25 things and send them along. I’ll publish them here–if you want me to.
With no further adieu: here are 25 random things about me:
- I am messy, but absolutely HATE living in my mess. I get tired of my mess every so often (but not often enough) and clean it up.
- I spill things all the time. ALL over the place. I trip going upstairs.
- And even though I’m a messy person in the physical world, I’m hyper organized in the virtual world. I blame GOOGLE for my lack of physical filing habits.
- I love radio3.cbc.ca. I love Indie music and discovering new music to add to my music collection. The airwaves in the States are pretty stagnant. Filled with bubblegum pop and no texture.
- I love the This American Life program produced by Ira Glass. I dream of meeting Ira Glass in person one day and having a cup of tea with him in my kitchen (his wife is invited too of course).
- I get loud, obnoxious hiccups if I drink pop, but not if I drink carbonated water.
- I grew up at Mile 906.8 Alaska Highway, Whitehorse, Yukon. 15 kms from nowhere.
- I am passionate about technology and the internet. It sometimes consumes me. And teaching others about how it works consumes me. I am grateful for the entire notion of blogging.
- I want to create and produce stories at the same caliber of This America Life, and The Vinyl Cafe.
- I have never visited New York City.
- I twiddle my hair. I used to have long hair and twiddle incessantly, but I have shorter hair now. I twiddle less. It still drives people crazy.
- I would like to stop doing so many things and stand still for awhile.
- When I was a kid, we had a dog we’d named Dr. Bear. We called him Bear for short. When we took him for walks in the campground across the highway from our house (Wolf Creek Campground–for those of you who know it), we’d call out Bear! Bear! to get him to come. And the campers would think we were announcing a real bear.
- One summer, my sister was crossing a tree across the creek, and she got to the other side and called, “Bear! Bear! Come here Bear!” and there really was a bear rooting around in the undergrowth. She hightailed it home and found our dog waiting for her.
- In the summer of 1994, I almost got eaten by a grizzly bear up in Kluane Park. (ALMOST might be a slight exaggeration, but there was a grizzly announcing to us that we were far too close for his comfort–which is a 200 metre radius BTW). We think we were lucky he had already eaten his dinner.
- I have hiked the Chilkoot Trail seven times in my life. The first time when I was 12. The last time when I was 35.
- I still have the first book I ever read: Danny and the Dinosaur. I started reading when I was five and fell in love with language. I love words. I keep two or three dictionaries in the house so I can refer to the dictionary when I feel I need to. Now, I have the internet, but I still love my dictionaries. And get lost in them when I open them up. Too bad my spelling sucks. I have to do something about that this year.
- I like snowboarding, but since moving to California, I don’t go as often as I could and I suck. One day on the ski lift up at Heavenly, some young kids looked at my board and exclaimed: “Wow. Hard core boarder, man. Those are original bindings!” Then they looked up at me, and were immediately disappointed. I laughed and said, “Not hard core fellas, just old!”
- I have a fire hydrant in my garage. Remanent of former tenants, but it’s too heavy to move. And what do you do with an extra fire hydrant?
- I love public radio. CBC.ca. BBC.co.uk. NPR.org. I love that on the internet, I can stream all of my favourite shows ANYTIME I want them. From any country. I should probably try to discover what Australian public radio is like.
- I like gingersnap cookies the best.
- For my Christmas present, I bought a Jack Lalanne juicer. It makes great juice. It also makes a huge mess. Or maybe, pursuant to item 1., I make the mess.
- In 2000, I took a sabbatical from Nortel Networks for six months and travelled to Central America and Europe. I spent a total of $10K from my retirement plan. My colleague reprimanded me for taking money from my retirement for what she considered to be a frivolity. By the time I got back from my memorable travels, my colleague’s retirement funds had plummeted more than $50K.
- I have approximately 50 GB of music on my hard drives from my music collection. I used to buy CDs. I now have iTunes.
- I started rollerblading in 1994. I used an entire paycheque to buy my blades. I still use them here in Healdsburg. Most people look at me oddly. But, I can go forward really fast on them. Really fast. And I love the feeling going forward really fast. I’ve been stopped by the Healdsburg police. They didn’t want me rollerblading near the town plaza. Also, a lady stopped her car once and reprimanded me for rollerblading in the street. I’ll be 37 this February. I think I’m a bit too old to be reprimanded.
Your #14 is a mixture of 2 different stories.
One day in the fall, it was later September, I was walking Bear in the campground and stopped to sit a moment on a picnic bench and ponder the universe. Bear went down the embankment to play in the creak. As I got lost in my ponderings, I also lost sight of the dog. I saw movement on the bank across the creek from me and thought it was the dog. As I looked closer, I became aware that it was a real black bear rooting around in the garbage cans. As I had trained my Bear to come to a whistle, I whistled for him and we made a hasty retreat home.
The 2nd story – one day I was crossing a tree that had fallen across the creek and I had Bear´s mom in tow. (Bear was a wee little thing and not out with us that day). But Bear´s mom lost her footing on the tree and fell in the creek. The creek at this point was exceptionally deep and there was a build up of debris is the bend of the creek. Bear´s mom was unable to get her hind legs under her to grip the debris. She kept going under the water. I saw that she was loosing her battle and jumped in after her. I had to hang onto a branch from the tree bridge and get my other arm under the dog. (I estimated the depth of the creek at this point to be over 6´deep.) The current was srong here and I had only slightly better luck using the debris as leverage. But the dog managed to use me to get herself out of the water and I eventually pulled myself out as well, after the dog was back on dry land.
Wow! I didn’t know that second story. And it was COLD WATER! Was that Sheena? Am glad you pulled yourself out.
Good GOD! What we were allowed to do as kids. We had so much freedom. Remember? The only thing we had to do was come home when Mum or Dad honked the horn.
Where are you now? I keep checking your Facebook for updates. Hope you are enjoying yourself. And creating life-long memorable experiences.
Love you,
J
The dog I rescued was Bear´s mom. I forget her name. Sheena was just was of our other dogs. She wasn´t related to Bear. She was collie & wolf. We got her as a pup from Dan & Audrey. And we got Bear from the Mannells.
Your blog design is gorgeous! Love your 25 Random Things list, especially #13. That’s hilarious! I did my list recently and now I’m checking out everyone else’s too.