25 Random Things About Me

Ah, another one of those fun pieces of ego-candy: a thing going around Facebook, called "25 Random Things About Me." I have really enjoyed reading the ones that my friends have written, but I'm still too much of a coward to post such a thing on Facebook where God-knows-who is looking at this list of stuff I'd rather reserve for friends. Of course, you could say the same thing about a blog, but to tell you the truth, I think a lot fewer people read the blog...and I think I know at least 90 per cent of you. So... since I enjoyed "y'all's," as they say down here, here's mine. Or "mahn."


1. I have been married to my best friend for over 25 years.
2. Literally everyone in my immediate family were/are musicians.
3. If I could live anywhere I wanted, I would split my time between New England, Taos/Santa Fe, the Pacific Northwest, and the west coast of Ireland.
4. The Buddhadharma changed my life.
5. I wish that I could live closer to my family, or they could live closer to me.
6. I have stood on the Great Wall of China.
7. I wish I had more time to actually practice the instruments I sort of play.
8. I’ve probably read Lord of the Rings about ten times, starting at age 12.
9. I love my job.
10. Within a 3-year period in the mid-90’s, I lost my Dad, I lost two teachers who were very dear to me, I lost a beloved cat, and I lost interest in finishing the doctorate I am now trying to finish.
11. I used to do astrology charts.
12. I love watching The Weather Channel.
13. When I was a small child I had nightmares so bad I often woke up screaming.
14. When I was a teenager I used to listen to the local AM radio station break out the Top Ten every Thursday night, then write them all down on little pieces of paper and save them in a box in my desk.
15. The names I had picked out in case I’d had kids were Melanie, Lauren, Clayton and Gavin.
16. Over the course of my youth I was deeply obsessed with several rock bands including the Beatles, Yes, and the Moody Blues.
17. I have never broken a bone, but I don’t have a gall bladder.
18. I absolutely love cats.
19. I believe that I lived in Boston during the American Revolution.
20. When I was a kid I could be an obnoxious know-it-all and my sister used to say “Thank You, Angela Brittanica.”
21. I am scared shitless of getting cancer. (Yes, I already had that done.)
22. I taught Sunday School when I was a teenager.
23. I was in my third grade class in Ludlow, MA when Kennedy was shot; I was making Christmas cookies in Cambridge, MA when Lennon was shot; I was teaching music in an alternative school in Salem, MA when the Challenger went down; and I was sitting in my house in Lubbock TX when Coyotebanjo called me from some morning meeting at the Buddy Holly Center in L to tell me about 9-11.
24. When I was a little kid I put home-made library check-out cards in all my little kid books.
25. Chocolate really does Change How You Feel.

Barackstock

As of late this afternoon, not a single arrest has been made on the Washington Mall.

1.8 million people.

One of the best moments of history I've been privileged to witness.

Yes We Can.

Hmmmmm . . .

In the "God tells ya stuff if ya listen" department: Did anyone else notice that on the DAY that the 43rd President officially gave his last (thank Christ) speech to the nation, a plane plummeted out of the sky in NYC . . . and everyone lived?

Insaneopause

You know, when you’re born, you start breathing, and unless something goes terribly wrong, you keep doing it until you die, even if you do it through some occasional congestion or ailment. Your excretory system, digestive system, cardiovascular system, all start working pretty promptly and, again, barring some ailment, quit when the credits roll to the end. They don’t just start when you’re 11 and make you crazy and then just quit working properly when you’re 53 and make you crazy again. But OK. Enough. Suppose we just accept that there IS a biological system that starts and stops while you’re still alive. Can’t it just start and stop, like a freaking stoplight? Green, go, yellow, wait a second oops! a baby popped out, red, stop, that’s the end, finito for chrissake. But NO no no no no. It can’t be that simple. It has to be OH what a lovely day JESUS look what’s happening in the Middle East wait! how sweet you are to do that for me – God, what assholes people are! Get me a gun! Gee, I feel great today, I think I’ll go work out. God – I feel terrible and crampy. Maybe I have cancer. Maybe I’m going to die! Gosh, I feel 16 again…look at that guy! Shit, he’s 25 omigod now I’m so embarrassed. Oh geez, I ate a piece of celery and gained 3 pounds. This line at the supermarket sucks! It’s taking so long! What the hell! Can’t they see I’m…Oh, what a sweet little puppy – I think I’m going to cry- - - aren’t there any Kleenex in here? What a terrible place – and it’s so cold in here…it’s so hot…I’m sweating…damn you, you pulled my blanket off! I hate you! I love you! I have the best job in the world! My job sucks! Can’t you be patient with me? I’m only 13. I mean 53. I mean – what do I mean? What was your name again?

Is it possible to just knock yourself out with Vicodin and wake up when you’re 60? For God’s sake people! This sucks!

And don’t hand me some crap about this all being the result of some glamorous Neanderthal’s obsession with an apple. It’s some catastrophic combination of magic and biology. You want a weapon of mass destruction?