This meme comes to us from Facebook, where I was tagged about 15 times to do it, and finally got around to. So here I present 25 random things about myself. Enjoy…
1. I have only lived in two states my entire life (NC & CA), and in both cases have lived in the capital city (Raleigh & Sacramento).
2. One of my favourite musical groups is Delerium. There are a number of songs that are so amazing that they make me cry. However, I can not stand to watch their videos or live performances because they are entirely too “bizarre”.
3. During my first sabbatical there was exactly one day that I thought I would not go back to work. I was on horseback on a farm in the northern part of Argentina. Cube livin’ isn’t going to work for me much longer.
4. When I’m asked to share something unknown about myself, the answer I give is always the same – that I sang in Carnegie Hall, which I did when I was in my senior year of high school as part of the North Carolina Youth Chorale. I’m trying to make it the most unknown thing about me.
5. I have three cats: Rowan, Lasher, and Siobhan. Rowan and Lasher are named after characters from the Anne Rice book, The Witching Hour. Siobhan is named thus because one of the singers in Bananarama was named Siobhan and I loved the name, but I originally planned to name her Ancient Evelyn and call her Evie. I went with Siobhan because my Aunt Coloriss didn’t seem to think that AE fit her very well.
6. I am an only child and have no living grandparents.
7. I have three addictions in life, and they are: sour cream, peanut butter, diet Pepsi vanilla.
8. The very first novel I wrote has a scene that is somewhat inappropriately erotic and involves two male prisoners tied to chairs in an empty room, a dominatrix, a whip, and disinfectant. It has absolutely nothing to do with the plot of the book, and I absolutely love it.
9. I filled out this meme in random order. First I just put a numbered list, then randomly selected a random thing at random and filled in the numbers until they were all gone. But what you don’t know is when I actually put in this one. Was it first? Second? Ninth? Last? I’m not telling.
10. The latest book I have published is a short called Thorn Valley. It does not have a happy ending, which I find incredibly pleasing.
11. My current favourite alcohol beverage is a liquor called Guayacura Licor de Damiana. It tastes like Christmas.
12. To date I have never broken a bone, and have only been in the hospital once to have my adenoids removed when I was about 5 years old.
13. I have a fear of needles, having blood taken, having my blood pressure taken, and having my pulse taken. This is why I go to the doctor less than once a year.
14. Although I have published 7 books, hardly any of my friends have bought them or read them. Rachelle Caruso is the only person who has read all of them.
15. I was investor #1 in Ellis’ new album, Break the Spell (http://www.ellis-music.com/news/)
16. I won first place in my 5th grade science fair for “Rats in a Maze”.
17. When I was in college I ran a GLBT resource website called The Rainbow Room. It was the most visited site at the entire university, and when the chancellor threatened to shut it down I protested and told them I would take legal action. The site remained up until I graduated. There are still links to it on various sites even though it’s been offline since December 1995.
18. I am an amazon.com Top 1000 Reviewer (currently: 793 as of 1/30/2009).
19. I drink decaf coffee when I get to work every morning. The reason I drink decaf is that I often teach classes in the mornings and I don’t want to have to leave class every 15 minutes to pee.
20. I am some level of OCD. I knock on wood, I check door locks multiple times, I have to touch all three cats before I will leave the house, I have a physical reaction if I don’t have access to antibacterial gel after visiting the gas station.
21. This was the last item I actually entered for this meme, because I like to mix it up.
22. I have a very poor long-term memory, and can remember almost nothing from college, high school, middle school, elementary school, or earlier. Even if I look in a yearbook I can only recognize a face but can recall no specific memories of the person or situations we may have been in together.
23. The two people who are the closest friends I have (besides my partner David) are Rachelle Caruso and Michael Waters. I have known Rachelle since 1996, and Michael since 1994. Unfortunately they both live thousands of miles from me, and I miss them terribly.
24. I refused to watch the film Wall-E because I can not handle seeing robots who have emotions being sad or hurt.
25. Now that I have finished the list (and I did actually write this one before I was done), I can’t remember who has tagged me on their own 25 Random Things notes, and so I’m going to have to just pick people at random. How very random.
