Meme

Bright tagged me for a meme, and I so enjoyed reading hers, I am excited to do my version.

I don’t know who reads this anymore who has their own blog, but if you do, I invite you to tag yourself and then let me know when you’ve posted yours. 🙂

The Rules
Step 1: respond and rework—answer the questions on your own blog, replace one question that you dislike with a question of your own invention, add one more question of your own.
Step 2: tag other un-tagged people.

Make a list of things you can see without getting up:
Various paraphernalia on my desk; LA-themed wall calendar; Elfa shelving with all kinds of art stuff; a gorgeous potted Cymbidium orchid my parents gave me for a housewarming present; bookshelves stocked with Harry Potter, Agatha Christie, the Boxcar Children, and Ngaio Marsh; the hall closet door.

Favorite Etsy shop:
I wish I had my own Etsy shop! Actually I made one once, but there’s nothing in it.

What are you wearing right now?
Thin white long-sleeved tee with metallic gold semicircle pattern around the neck, layered over a black cami and a bra I like because it gives me a gentle retro shape, black undies, new jeans I love because they are smaller size of another pair of jeans that kept falling off my hips!

What color are the eyes of the person you love most in the world?
Brown. I think nearly all the people I love most in the world have brown eyes. ;b

What’s the last thing you read/are currently reading?
The Smartest Guys in the Room for book club, the book about “the amazing rise and scandalous fall” of Enron. It’s surprisingly gripping, even if words like “fiscal” tend to put me to sleep instantly. What I just got in the mail from PaperBackSwap, and am very eager to begin, is Norah Vincent’s Self-Made Man. Vincent went “undercover” as a man for a while and then wrote about what that was like. I’ve been wanting to read it for ages.

What is the last thing you cooked?
I fried a couple of eggs for Erik and me, to go on top of the noodles he’d made for lunch. I topped them with Baconsalt, which I just bought yesterday and am enjoying quite a lot. (No, it doesn’t really taste like bacon, but it’s very yummy just the same. And highly artificial.)

What is your favorite restaurant of all time?
I am so incapable of answering this question, I won’t even try. I once used this very question as my security question for a web account, and when I called back a year later to cancel, I kept the custserv guy on the phone forever while I tried out various responses. He was very nice about it, and even tried to give me hints, which I’m sure he wasn’t supposed to do. I never did figure out my answer, and that made cancelling the account very roundabout and troublesome.

What’s your current obsession/addiction?
Pumpkin chocolate-chip muffins from Mariposa Bakeshop. They’re gluten- and dairy- free! And phenomenally delicious!

What was the last gift you gave?
Ooh, I spent yesterday afternoon wrapping Jackie’s (belated) birthday present, but she hasn’t received it yet so I can’t say what it is!

What are you listening to right now?
The sound of my own typing. Not an exciting answer, I realize.

What movie do you know every word to?
I don’t think there is any such movie. I think the movie that has my favorite words in it, though, is Clue:
“I’m merely a humble butler.”
“What exactly do you do?”
“I buttle.”

If you could have any super power, what would it be?
I can never decide whether flying would be fun, or just scary and cold. Oooh, how about the ability to eat anything and never have undue weight gain or indigestion? THAT would be fabulous. And also enabling, but oh well — bring on the bacon-mayo-butter-brioche sandwiches! ;b

If you could have a house–totally paid for, fully furnished–anywhere in the world, where would you want it to be?
I’m pretty happy with the house we’re in. 😉 Could we move it off the Hayward Fault, though? Maybe to Mendocino, with a teleportation port that’ll bring us (and our car) back to the East Bay whenever we like?

Where is your ideal vacation?
Honestly, if I can get away from crowds, sit in light mixed-sun/shade and a fresh breeze, look out at a view, read, write, draw, and have some good food and hot tea, that’ll suit me just fine. And since we can do that at home (as soon as we get a big umbrella), who needs a vacation?

Name one thing you just can’t resist no matter how bad it is for you.
There isn’t just one. The list is very long. It starts with: macaroni and cheese, fresh flat rice noodles cooked almost any way, homemade pie, filled chocolates, mayo-and-seafood salads, good quality bacon when it’s right in front of me…

If you could meet anyone famous–dead or alive–who would it be?
I’d love to hang out with Laura Ingalls Wilder. When I was younger, I had a fantasy that young Laura would time-travel into my life, and I’d show her around the twentieth century. It’s still a fond daydream of mine.

If you could have any job in the world, what would it be?
Artist-writer-humanitarian-piemaker.

You see a cute baby, what is your reaction?
Smile and wave. If it seems appropriate, peekaboo.

Your favorite day spent in another country?
I’ve traveled so little, I don’t feel I can answer this one.

If your life could have a soundtrack? Name a song on it–
Bach’s Goldberg Variations.

Which literary character most resembles yourself?
I like Francie from A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, and Madeleine L’Engle’s Vicky Austin.

If you were an animal, you’d be:
Kitteh. Duh.

What was your strangest dream?
I liked one in which I swung, Tarzan-like, across a forest of Persian rugs. But as far as my dreams go, that one is rather low on the strangeness scale.

What is your greatest fear?
Let’s put them all together: helplessly watching loved ones die, right before I myself die, drowning in deep water, before I’ve ever made anything of myself. *shudder*

What is one thing you wish you could like, but you just can’t?
Swimming comes to mind.

—
Went to a wonderful yoga class this morning with Kimber Simpkins — I plan to go to this one every week. Yay!! We talked about The Four Agreements and there was live music and singing.

So far, in spite of missing all my LA friends (and the Arclight!!), I am much happier in the Bay Area — I just like the culture here much better. And it doesn’t hurt that we live in this gorgeous house either.