Seven Random Facts

Ken over at Read/Write/Run has tapped me to write 7 random facts about myself after he, himself was infected with the idea from Becki at The Middle Miles.  I do not see her post on this, so I'm assuming in this spreading epidemic of "seven random facts" that she is simply a carrier.  Obviously, given the fact I'm writing this, I am fully susceptible to the contagion.  Note to self:  zombie movie where the zombies are created from a magical curse placed on a chain letter...nevermind, that sounded better in my head.  Write 5 more people for good luck and an unnatural hankering for brain stew (not the Green Day song).

3...2...1...Contact!

1)  I don't/can't do planes.  I hate heights, but compound that with a plane someone else is in control of (which also makes me uncomfortable) and I can't do it.  I did try once, but I locked up like the Tin Man at the airport, and I've kind of given up on it.  I still work a little on the heights thing at times when I feel up to it.  I've climbed ladders up to 50 ft roofs and I was on steel grating about 100 feet up at a wood burning power plant not too long ago (which is a win despite the fact I bailed on going the next floor up).  When I did the Warrior Dash, there were quite a few climbing obstacles that I just had to swallow that lump in my throat and just do without thinking.  Is it possible to fly if you're completely unconscious?  When are we going to develop teleportation devices?

"Will you knock me out, please?"

2)  I'm probably much more abrasive in person than I seem here.  You may not see it here much because I'm generally writing with a good mood wind at my back, and I think overall I am fairly good-natured, easy-going, and fun-loving person.  However, I love a good debate, and I will argue points I don't even believe in to the point where a lot of people get visibly upset with me.  Sometimes that's the best part of starting the debate in the first place.  I will usually accept a defeat gracefully, though, but you have to actually win first.  The only exception is when someone is trying to persuade me to do something I really don't want to do.  Whatever logic you throw at me, doesn't matter, no means no.  Other than that, I'm also very direct, and sometimes not very tactful at being so.  I let a lot of things fly out of my face in my outdoor voice that shouldn't go past the tongue at all.  Also, sometimes I can seem like I'm blowing people off, when I'm really not.  Things like that.  I still have a great deal to learn about living in society, and sometimes even when I'm congnizant of what I should do and how I should be, I knowingly refuse to do or be so.

3) Peaches and Ham are my food Kryptonite.  Anything predominantly containing peaches is disgusting to me.  I don't like them, and I don't like them in anything, either.  I will, on rare occasions, suffer through a beer with peach notes, but that's about as far as it goes.  The story goes that while my dear mother was pregnant for me, she ate nearly an entire bushel of peaches over the course of a week.  I guess I was sick of them before I was even born.  The ham, well, I just hate it.  I don't really like any pork products much, honestly (yes even bacon...I know that makes me less of a man).

4) I'm "Sweet-talker" Drunk.  Some people are sad drunks, some are raging angry drunks, and some are just foolish drunks (and all of those have materialized in me as well at certain times), but the most common drunk you get from me is this.  It is a super power that I wish I could pass along to my single male friends.  However, it still works really well on the wife, so it isn't being wasted.   It's not just some misplaced perception of myself, either.  This classification has come from outside sources.  

5) I have an extensive collection of Care Bears.  I loved them growing up, and I still make reference to them to this day.  This led to me getting one as a present once.  Then came another and another.  Eventually it got out of hand, and I bought a few myself.  It's okay now though, I've stopped (I think).

6) I once moved in with my worst enemy.  No, I'm not talking just deciding to move in with someone and them being the roommate from hell.  I'm talking flat out moving in with the person you may like least in the world at the time.  How does this happen?  I still don't know.  He was finishing up school and wanted to get out of his Mom's, and wanted a roommate.  Nobody else was available or responsible enough to room with him at the time.  So he asked me if I wanted to get a place with him.  At the time, considering where he was looking, there was no benefit for me to do this.  It wasn't going to be cheaper for me.  I wasn't any closer to work, and I wasn't really the type to want permanent company.  I liked my place to myself, and it was all clean, all mine, and at whatever temperature I wanted, with the TV on whatever movie or antenna receivable station I chose, or any music I wanted in the background.  I guess I just realized my life could use a shake-up, so I said went along with it just to see what would happen.  Long story short, as it stands now, the guy's one of the best friends I have, and in the process I've added several other close friends because of this move.  It could also be argued that this sudden change in life trajectory led me directly to my wife as well.

"The Roommate!"

7)  I'm sometimes a "walker"...a sleepwalker, that is.  It's not something that happens often, but it has been known to happen from time to time.  Each time I've done it, it's been in conjunction with times of great stress in my life.  It's only happened once in the past 5 years, and it happened at my wife's (girlfriend at the time) apartment only a few months into our relationship.  The details of these episodes are always more funny than frightening.

Good early 90s comic that never quite caught on