100 Random Things About Me

This promises to be a lengthy entry. I got the idea from Ms Papercuts' blog, so I figured, what the hell? It was originall 50, but since Ms Papercuts expanded hers to 100, I felt the need to do the same. Feel free to skip it, but it might be good for a laugh.

1. In my life, I have been a Born Again Christian, an agnostic, and an atheist, not necessarily in that order.
2. I am a 3rd generation Navy wife, and 5th generation military wife.
3. In the last 10 years, I have worked in retail jewelry, medical equipment repair, the rental car industry, the gas & welding industry, and the adult entertainment industry.
4. When I got married, I walked down the aisle to "The Imperial Death March" from "The Empire Strikes Back". I also had a stuffed Rhode Island Red Rooster as a centerpiece at the rehearsal dinner.
5. I am terrified of needles, but I have three tattoos and am addicted to acupuncture.
6. I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia when I was 17, probably had it since I was 11 or 12, but have been 100% symptom-free since I was 25.
7. My high school and college (Associate's Degree) graduations were less than a week apart.
8. I have a shameless crush on Joaquin Phoenix, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, and Angelina Jolie (among others).
9. I'm afraid of flying, but went skydiving right before my 24th birthday...and would do it again in a heartbeat.
10. I've lived on the East Coast for almost 5 years, but have never been to New York.
11. I've been to 28 U.S. states, 2 U.S. territories (Guam & Saipan), and 2 countries (Canada and Japan).
12. I'm ambidextrous at almost everything, except for writing (left-handed), scissors (right-handed), and can openers (right-handed). I shoot, bowl, and fence with either hand.
13. I used to own a 44 magnum revolver and an SKS assault rifle.
14. My family is so military that my grandmother saw my attempt to join the Peace Corps as an act of rebellion.
15. My political views vary dramatically from very conservative to very liberal.
16. My iPod includes Marty Robbins, KMFDM, Clannad, Arsenium, Duran Duran, 30 Seconds to Mars, and Garth Brooks.
17. My vampire novel was inspired by a series of e-mails and inside jokes with Ms Papercuts, but the story is srs bznz.
18. I was thrown out of a strip club in Guam.
19. I have over 20 novels in the works.
20. I have met Harry Anderson ("Night Court"), Diamond Rio, the lead singer of Lone Star, Linda Evans, and several regular cast members of "The X-Files".
21. When I lived in Washington, one of my biggest phobias was being on a horse during an earthquake. In 1996, I was in a small earthquake (5.4) while on a horse. Now my biggest phobia is winning the lottery.
22. I once submitted a query to a magazine, and they published the query instead of the article I was planning to write.
23. My husband and I are childfree by choice.
24. I liked -- and am unashamed to admit that I still like -- "Titanic" and "The Blair Witch Project".
25. I refuse to watch "Saw", "Touristas", "Hostel", or any other film that is nothing more than human beings suffering for the pleasure/entertainment of another human being. Gratuitous torture is not entertaining to me.
26. I own copies of the Bible, the Qur'an, and the Satanic Bible, and I've read all of them.
27. I loathe willful ignorance.
28. I have never dyed my hair.
29. The last time I wore makeup was at my wedding (12/14/2002).
30. I own somewhere around 3,000 books.
31. I have been accused of having OCD, ADD, ADHD, Asperger's, and Bi-Polar disorder.
32. I am allergic to potatoes.
33. I can't stand the taste of beer.
34. In spite of #'s 32 and 33, I am Irish.
35. I once walked out of a mosh pit with a bloody nose and bruises on my side...at a Christian rock concert.
36. I have lived in a haunted house.
37. I cuss like a sailor, and have since I was in 2nd grade.
38. I have a strange phobia about anything around my neck. This includes turtlenecks, scarves, and chokers. When someone put his hand on my neck at a party a few months ago, I very nearly beat the shit out of him.
39. I do not like perfume or cologne...EXCEPT for Hugo Boss, which I LOVE.
40. When my grandmother died, I stopped going to my therapist of 7+ years because my "problem" was dead. She agreed.
41. I used to have a hedgehog named "Fluffy".
42. I have been on the air on "The Tom Leykis Show" 3 times.
43. My mom printed me a T-shirt last year that says "Military Wife - Sexually Deprived for Your Freedom". The design was my husband's. When I wore it to the gym, 2 guys almost fell off of their treadmills.
44. Our bedroom is (well, until I repaint it tomorrow) black with red, yellow, and blue splatters.
45. I have only cried during two movies in my entire life: "What Dreams May Come" and "Ladder 49".
46. Five of my ex-boyfriends attended my wedding. Two others were invited but couldn't make it.
47. My two male cats are gay. Srsly.
48. I write fantasy, but I have never read Tolkien, Jordan, Eddings, Rowling, or Brooks.
49. When I collected and showed model horses, I was notorious for giving them bizarre names: Confederate Oyster, Satanic Panic, Modern Mouse Collective, Holy Hand Grenade, Castle Anthrax, Machiavelli Approves, and Snorting Altoids are but a few.
50. In the time it took me to write this, I probably could have finished two chapters of one of my books.
51. I would love to get back into fencing and start competing. I would absolutely die if I made it to the Olympics.
52. There are commercially released pornos floating around with my name in the credits. (I was the editor)
53. My middle name is Ann, but I am reasonably certain that several hospitals in the United States are petitioning to have it changed to "non-compliant patient".
54. I have gotten concussions by falling off of a horse, being on a malfunctioning roller coaster, and passing out in the jewelry store where I worked.
55. My husband and I used to be professional photographers.
56. I have been set foot on more ships than my husband, who is a sailor.
57. I adore animals. If I'm having a shitty day, and see a squirrel or a turtle or something, it will actually make me feel better.
58. I can drive for up to 6 hours without stopping at all, but once I pass the 8 hour mark (regardless of the number of stops), I'd rather gouge my eyeballs out than continue.
59. I actually have a "bucket list".
60. Ireland, Siberia, Machu Picchu, Angkor Wat, Tibet, Australia, and Iceland are all on my "places to go before I die" list.
61. I am 100% pro gay marriage, pro-choice, and I support FairTax.
62. I have seen "Monty Python and the Search for the Holy Grail" probably about 8 billion times. I have also been to see "Spamalot" when it came to Seattle.
63. Though I usually don't take crap from people, I am very non-confrontational and will avoid conflict whenever possible.
64. I seriously considered a career in politics until I realized that it's 95% baby-kissing crowd-waving fundraising smiling-for-the-camera bullshit, and only about 5% actually getting things done.
65. I trained for 6 months for the Seattle-to-Portland bike ride in 1999 (200 miles in 2 days). 50 miles into the ride, someone pushed me into a ditch and I fucked up my knee. I couldn't walk without crutches for 4 days...but I finished the ride.
66. I once won a radio contest and got a trip to Las Vegas to see Garth Brooks with front row tickets and backstage passes. However, I was 2 months shy of my 18th birthday, and they wouldn't let me go.
67. I dug Lance Armstrong before Lance Armstrong was cool, and I still do.
68. My earliest publishing credits were a couple of satirical articles that my mom and I put into the Morgan Horse magazine she published. The circulation was about 1500 in the Pacific Northwest, Montana, California, and British Columbia.
69. My wedding was in an industrial screenprinting shop, and it ROCKED.
70. I think the Experience Music Project is the most ungodly eyesore in Seattle.
71. I have wanted to be a published author as long as I can remember.
72. Throughout my life, I have had cats, dogs, horses, rats, degus, goats, a hedgehog, and a ferret.
73. I have been working, off and on, on my current novel since 1997.
74. I once came up with a creature for a science fiction novel that was based on a ceiling fan.
75. Though I have always loved "The Stand" and "Hope Springs Eternal" (aka, "The Shawshank Redemption"), I didn't particularly care for Stephen King as a writer until I read "On Writing".
76. From 5th-12th grades, I played the clarinet, bass clarinet, and saxophone.
77. I have never done any kind of recreational drug, including marijuana, even though I was born and raised in the Seattle area.
78. I didn't start drinking until I was 21 (with the exception of one trip to Canada when I was 19), and had mostly stopped by the time I was 22.
79. I have a problem with my vision that has baffled eye doctors since I was a teenager. I see everything as being somewhat "grainy", and the grains move, change colors, etc. I have to keep my computer monitor very dark because white backgrounds (i.e., the text field in which I'm currently typing) flash and change colors. A University of Washington ophthalmologist finally figured out that, in all likelihood, the rods and cones in my retina fire too quickly, resulting in gaps in my vision.
80. My brother and his wife were married 3 months after Eddie and me, by the same minister.
81. My foot is currently asleep and driving me nuts, but I don't want to disturb the cat that is sleeping on it, so I haven't moved it.
82. I can do push-ups. Real, honest-to-God, knees off the floor, push-ups.
83. My orthodontist dislocated my jaw while "fixing" my overbite. It took 2 years, 3 dentists, 2 TMJ specialists, 1 osteopath, and 2 MD's to diagnose it.
84. I have no respect for people who use litigation to get rich.
85. "The Shawshank Redemption", "The Usual Suspects", "Gladiator", "Walk The Line", "The Bucket List", and "South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut" are some of my favorite movies.
86. I have never loved a book or movie character more than I love Achmed in Elizabeth Hayden's "Rhapsody" series.
87. I am fascinated with assassins, and have incorporated them into most of my fantasy novels.
88. It is extremely rare for me to go as long as an hour without thinking about one or more of my stories. I have to have a pen and paper within reach at all times, because I have been known to come up with ideas, fix plot problems, or come up with characters at totally random times.
89. I used to keep a tape recorder in the car in case I thought of something while driving (which I constantly do), but I never played the tapes back because I hate the sound of my own voice.
90. A doctor told me when I was 16 that there was a possibility that I had multiple sclerosis or cancer in my spinal cord. Though it turned out to be something much more benign, the experience rattled me deeply, and I have never taken life for granted since then.
91. While I was polishing her feet at a show, my horse once kneed me in the face and cracked a filling in one of my teeth.
92. For me, one of the hardest parts about being an atheist is knowing that I will never see my loved ones again after this life. It has also contributed to my fear of flying.
93. I don't celebrate Valentine's Day. It took almost 5 years of marriage to convince Eddie that I'm serious when I say "do NOT buy me anything for Valentine's Day". I believe Valentine's Day has become nothing more than a reason for men to stress and spend money, and a chance for women to become catty and competitive with each other. No matter what a man buys, someone at the office will have gotten something bigger/better/more expensive, and in a year, he'll have to top whatever he did anyway. There is no "love" in that, only obligation and demands. A single red rose any day of the year means a thousand times more than a dozen red roses on Valentine's Day.
94. My speech has never been 100% the same since my last concussion in 2000 (when I passed out at the jewelry store). I stumble over words, mix up pronouns, and sometimes have problems enunciating. This is a neverending source of frustration for me.
95. I wear white socks with my Birkenstocks. It's a Seattle thing...you wouldn't understand.
96. I cannot have pedicures, foot massages, or anything of the sort because I cannot stand to have my feet touched.
97. I believe that men and woman can be close friends without anything "happening"...even if they were more than friends in the past.
98. When I find out that someone I know has some sort of "expertise", my first thought is "Ooooo, a brain to pick..." for my writing.
99. I am a creature of habit. When I go to a restaurant, I always order the same thing from that particular restaurant, which may differ significantly from what I always order from a different restaurant. One deli got to the point that all I had to do was call, give them my name, and they'd start my order. When I go to the library, I always sit at the same table. I'm insane.
100. I did a paper about "Mein Kampf" in my college Sociology class in 1997. The teacher had positive, glowing comments all throughout the paper...except for one paragraph in which I commented that Hitler raised a valid argument in one chapter (I don't remember what it was, but it was a small part of one chapter and really had nothing to do with the rest of his maniacal rantings). I got a "C" on the paper, and 11 years later, it still annoys me.

So there you have it: 100 things you probably could have died without knowing about me. Do the same in your blog and post a link in the comments. C'mon, you know you want to.