10 things about me: a meme

[altariel]

kerravonsen tagged me on the 10 weird things meme.

Rules: Each player of this game starts off with 10 weird things/habits/little known facts about yourself. People who get tagged need to write a blog of their own 10 weird habits/things/little known facts as well as state this rule clearly. At the end you need to choose 10 people to be tagged and list their names.

I’ll tag, but don’t feel obliged to do it if you don’t want.

1. This year I have been mostly reading – in fact, only reading – books written by women. Not intentionally, it’s just turned out that way. (Before anyone asks: Doris Lessing, a pile of Phryne Fishers, another pile of Ruby Ferguson’s Jill books, and a reread of Katherine Paterson’s beloved Bridge to Terebithia.)

2. This week I have been mostly listening to Blur’s 13. And jolly good it is too, except I have to skip past the third track (Coffee and TV) because the video upset me so much when it first came out. (It’s the one about the sad adventures of a little animated milk carton in the big bad world.)

3. I’m not fussy about foodstuffs per se, but scrambled eggs and cooked tomatoes SHOULD NOT TOUCH. They need a neutral zone of bacon between them. I haven’t worked out what sacred-and-profane thing is going on here: perhaps I have some trace memory of a terrible millennia-long intergalactic war between the Ancient and Most Noble Scrambled Egg People and the wicked, jackbooted, goose-stepping High Order of the Cooked Tomato. Or I could just be a bit funny. Still, you never know. (Of course the Bacon Collective would be agents of peace.)

4. I do not own nor do I drive a car. (But surely you know this already? This is turning out to be really hard! I must try to be more discreet – or perhaps talk less – about myself.)

5. I am my own favourite topic of conversation. Hence this meme. Again, you may already know this.

6. I have just watched the whole of season 1 of The Wire with the subtitles switched on (as in fact I do with many programmes). Firstly, because I found I couldn’t follow some of the dialogue. Secondly, because I was using my exercise bike through many episodes and couldn’t hear over it. Thirdly, I think I may be going slightly deaf. Fourthly, I got used to having them there. Fifthly, I have a strong cognitive bias towards the written word, and like to process dialogue that way. (By ‘using my exercise bike’ I do in fact mean ‘for exercising’ and not for, say, constructing a massive neutral zone between any stray cooked tomatoes or scrambled eggs that might happen to fall into my living room. That wouldn’t work very well.)

7. I am not smarter than the average bear, because bears can swim and I can’t.

8. I can’t fish either, nor have I tried. In my own defence, I think I might be able to work out how both to swim and fish; if in imminent danger of drowning, say, or starving. So perhaps in all fairness to me we ought to call the bear thing ‘not proven’. I am ‘not proven’ to be smarter than the average bear.

9. And I don’t hold with marmalade, thereby further differentiating me from the bears.

10. Nor do I hold with ironmongery, whether it wears well or no. Oh hang on, that’s Gaffer Gamgee... Er, I particularly like the film with the bears that they often show on Sunrise Earth. I mention this in case anyone is starting to think I have some kind of thing against the bears. Which I don’t; in fact, I have an exceptionally loved bear called ‘Barnaby’. Which I think now gives you 11 little known facts about me.

I hereby tag: dkpalaska; greyonblue;heyiya;jhall1;qatsi;rakshathedemon;redstarrobot;steepholm;thanatos_kalos;wiseheart.

Comments

[emeraldsedai.livejournal.com]

Not even lime marmalade?? It was invented by koala bears.

Great list. I'm tempted to snag the meme, because our friends lists have few in common, so my chances of being revealed as Way Less Witty Than altariel are limited.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

If there must be preserves on the toast (and I'm not convinced of that), then it should be jam. But preferably marmite.

Please meme! It was a lot of fun to do, a perfect outlet during a day of boring admin and other tedious mucking around.

[emeraldsedai.livejournal.com]

I'm one of the twelve Americans who like Marmite, and I agree it's very nice on toast.

So I was sad to discover recently that Marmite's weird love-it-or-hate-it flavor is largely powered by free glutamic acids, better known as MSG. Naturally occurring, but still hard to tolerate. I suspect that free glutamic acids may be a causative factor in the panic attacks I'm subject to, so I sadly said goodbye to my jar of Marmite. I'll miss it.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Oh no! (And MSG is all over the place: have you had to cut it out entirely?)

[emeraldsedai.livejournal.com]

I don't think it would be possible to avoid it altogether, but I'm pretty scrupulous about it as an additive. In its naturally-occurring form (as a product of fermentation), it makes life worth living, so I dole it out.

Once while traveling in France I had a picnic meal featuring salami, red wine, and blue cheese. I could barely breathe afterwards! So I'm careful about piling on the umami.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

salami, red wine, and blue cheese. I could barely breathe afterwards

:-( As you say, the things that make life worth living.

[the-wild-iris.livejournal.com]

I also watch with subtitles a lot (my DVD player defaults to having them switched on, for some reason). But I enjoy sadistically looking out for things that have been misspelled/misunderstood by the (probably horribly rushed) subtitlers.

[communicator.livejournal.com]

I use subtitles all the time for the same reasons mentioned - visual bias, a bit deaf, lots of noises going on. I then have to keep the family informed about the mistakes in the subtitles: 'He said it was urgent, not Asian!'

[altariel.livejournal.com]

matildabj linked to this Charlie Brooker article where he ends up ranting about how bad voice recognition software is: "It got every sixth word wrong, which meant you'd swear in exasperation, and it would think you had finished each sentence by saying, 'Offer fox ache', and type that in too."

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Particularly enjoyable with live news and (historically) Top of the Pops.

[executrix.livejournal.com]

A francophone Browncoat is posting discussions of the Firefly French subtitles at fireflyfans.net. Nothing as hilarious as the Samuel Fuller war movie where the scream of incoming "Tanks!" was rendered as "Merci!" but, well, I'm glad those subtitles weren't my only key to the 'Verse.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Watching very well-known shows dubbed into languages I do understand is another innocent pleasure I have enjoyed, e.g. Garak and Bashir conversing in Spanish.

[glitterboy1.livejournal.com]

I like doing that, too. It also feels vaguely useful - you never know when you might need the German for 'deflector shields'.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Wise words, sir, wise words.

[the-wild-iris.livejournal.com]

The bootleg Lord of the Rings subtitles are also a special example of the art.

the scream of incoming "Tanks!" was rendered as "Merci!"

But not quite as special as that :)

[six-old-cars.livejournal.com]

For some inexplicable reason my DVD player defaults to subtitles on if there's already a disc in when you press the "power" remote button, but only on certain discs (Seasons 2 and 3 of Stargate SG-1, but not season 1, for example).

Oh, and I entirely agree about the eggs and tomatoes thing.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

I entirely agree about the eggs and tomatoes thing.

Oh good! I knew it couldn't just be me.

[katlinel.livejournal.com]

Marmalade is yukky. Poor citrus fruit to fall to such a doom.

That's a lot of reading you've done this year already.

Barnaby is an excellent name for a bear.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Poor citrus fruit to fall to such a doom.

They'll be coming for us one day.

That's a lot of reading you've done this year already.

Both the Jill and the Phryne books take on average an hour.

[kerravonsen]

I don't like marmalade either!

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

I dislike orange marmalade, but adore lemon. Can't remember about lime.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

But I like Paddington. Bear, not station.

[toft-froggy.livejournal.com]

I don't like marmalade either.

5. I am my own favourite topic of conversation. Hence this meme. Again, you may already know this.


Me too! Yay! Now it is cool to be self-fascinated, I can come out of the closet.

[toft-froggy.livejournal.com]

(as self-fascinated)

[altariel.livejournal.com]

*eyebrows descend*

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

Re 4 & 5: I will have to demur and say that it seems to me you talk about yourself (and other things in general) less since you've been writing professionally; I sometimes feel we don't hear from you enough. :)

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Aw, thank you! I got out of the habit while I was in the US with no net access, and the correlation between net access and productivity became so striking that I had to make the decision to limit my time on LJ. I'm trying to post once a week, though.

[windswept1.livejournal.com]

I am not smarter than the average bear

Slightly long but have you read Gonna Be a Bear? pasted below... Don't know who wrote it, but clearly, none of us are smarter than bears:))

In this life I’m a woman. In my next life, I’d like to come back as a bear.

When you’re a bear, you get to hibernate. You do nothing but sleep for Six months. I could deal with that.

Before you hibernate, you’re supposed to eat yourself stupid. I could deal with that too.

When you’re a girl bear, you birth your children (who are the size of walnuts) while you’re sleeping and wake to partially grown, cute cuddly cubs. I could definitely deal with that.

If you’re a mama bear, everyone knows you mean business. You swat anyone who bothers your cubs. If your cubs get out of line, you swat them too. I could deal with that.

If your a bear, your mate EXPECTS you to wake up growling. He EXPECTS that you will have hairy legs and excess body fat.

Yup… i’m gonna be a bear.

hee hee:)

[altariel.livejournal.com]

I hadn't read that! Awesome! (And persuasive!) I knew you'd use that icon!

[windswept1.livejournal.com]

I knew you'd use that icon!

Heh he:))

Meme response, though not quite to the rules...

[dkpalaska.livejournal.com]

Oh, gosh... Trying to get me to make that first blog post to my LJ, are you? :P

Resistance may be (eventually) futile, but I’ll try to hold out a little longer. I will share here, if you like – though far less originally, eloquently or entertainingly than you did!

1. I am utterly in love with Girl Genius comics (girlgeniousonline.com). It’s a recent love affair – just discovered this past year – although I have been a long-time fan of certain graphic novels and comic series.

2. I grew up on a cotton farm in Texas.

3. I had a pony when I was very little. Sort of. He was a bit wild and had a habit of bucking bigger people off, but my father could lead me around on him without a problem. (After my gangly older brothers, he probably didn’t even notice my weight.)

4. I hate shopping for clothes or shoes, unless it is related to hiking or skiing.

5. To address a very important matter referenced above: If breakfast is limited by time, I prefer peanut butter on my toast, sometimes with a light topping of honey. If I have the chance to be more decadent, a full-on bacon and fried egg sandwich, please.

Bagels, on the other hand, get slathered in butter and put in the toaster oven. In any case, I best like my toasted breads very dark, right on the edge of burnt.

6. I still have my teddy bear from when I was, like, three. I am uncertain if it will survive my children, however.

7. I watch almost no TV, and see very few movies.

8. I hate to have attention drawn to myself; handling compliments gracefully is often difficult for me.

9. Possibly related corollary: on the Introvert-Extrovert scale, I am pegged up against the far side of “I”.

10. Perversely, I did some stage acting in high school and loved it.

Re: Meme response, though not quite to the rules...

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Trying to get me to make that first blog post to my LJ, are you? :P

See my "innocence" icon... ;-)

I hate shopping for clothes too. I'm only 5ft tall, and nothing ever fits. I have long feet for my height, and that makes boot buying almost impossible.

And I still have my teddy from when I was little too (the 'Barnaby' of my post).

My introverted other half did a lot of acting at high school. I've not really acted (a couple of cabaret sketches at a convention), but I used to sing in a choir. A way for creative introverts to express themselves without "being themselves", perhaps?

Re: Meme response, though not quite to the rules...

[dkpalaska.livejournal.com]

See my "innocence" icon... ;-)

Uh-huh. "Garak" says it all... (Love that icon, btw!)

A way for creative introverts to express themselves without "being themselves", perhaps?

I don't know about the "creative" part where I'm concerned, lol! But yes, for me I definitely think there was that attractive element of being able to step into the spotlight and become another person. And as that other person, I could be flamboyant and extroverted in a way that was never comfortable when interacting with my peers.

Re: Meme response, though not quite to the rules...

[altariel.livejournal.com]

My brilliant friend msmanna mad the icon for me: I love it to bits, he has such a cheeky smile at the end of the animation.

I've never acted (far too shy), but imagine it to be an intensely creative process: entering into the experience of another person. It seems to be very like writing: getting totally immersed into someone else. Only I get to hide behind a computer screen and/or pages of text, and not have to stand in front of a bunch of other people ;-)

ETA: Forgot to say, I think reading is a creative act, and you're a terrific reader!