Unshelved by Bill Barnes and Gene Ambaum
comic strip overdue media

Friday, November 15, 2002

What to do when you have a half-day and it's a rainy mess outside?



Why, I went over to the little shopping centre across the street, did some small amount of shopping (Great Harvest Bread, orange juice, soda, and a video, things to get me through a weekend of rain and possibly snow flurries), came home, and slept. So now I'm awake, and just getting moving (it's 9 pm) and unexpectedly home alone on a Friday, all warm and snuggly, and kind of liking it. After all, tomorrow is another day. (Damn, I always hated that line. I wanted to ring Scarlett's little white neck by the end of the film).

Anyway, I'm catching up on reading blogs, and found this set of questions on Zabet's, and thought it would make a good Friday Five substitute. As usual, the answers get windier as I go along. Feel free to skip over anything that bores you. :)

Number of times I have been in love: One and a half. (I still wonder if I was ever in love with my ex, but I think I was, briefly, although in that adolescent way. One was definitely the whole way, but unrequited. I understand scads of songs and poems by frustrated lovers now).
Number of times I have had my heart broken: Two.
Number of hearts I have broken: None.
Number of boys I have kissed: Four. One was my cousin at age two. We have a picture of me with him up against the wall. As a child, you'd never know how meek I was going to turn out. I also had a huge crush on twins next door. At age five I announced that one was my husband, and one was my boyfriend. Hmmm...
Number of girls I have kissed: One.
Number of men I've slept with: Three.
Number of girls I've slept with: One.
Number of continents I have lived in: Just the one, unfortunately. I'd love to live around the world.
Number of drugs taken illegally: Hmmm...amyl nitrate was legal when I tried it--smelled like gym socks, ugh. Alcohol wasn't for my age (18-21), so I guess one. But I decided I didn't like either.
Number of people I would classify as true, could-trust-with-my-life type friends: One.
Number of people I consider my enemies: None, really. At one time there were more.
Number of people from high school that I stayed in contact with: None.
Number of CDs that I own: Twenty-five.
Number of piercings: Two--one in each ear. I would call that kind of boring and normal, but I think more piercings are getting to be the norm, even among people I would never think would get them.
Number of tattoos: None. I just can't get over the idea of being old and decrepit with a tatoo hanging limply from some part of my anatomy.
Number of times my name has appeared in the newspaper: Something like fifteen--mostly letters to the editor, one article I wrote, marriage and divorce, and school-related stuff. Only one was criminal, and it was thankfully minor, back in the days when my checking acount had more holes than Swiss cheese and I'd had one too many oopses in bouncing cheques.
Number of scars on my body: Oh, gee, lots. The main ones are from falling over a toy train at age 3, locking a thumb in a car door as a college freshman, being bitten by a hamster, being bitten by a squirrel, and then years of compulsively picking at these bumps I've gotten since I was a little kid. The worst two are from the last; as I've gotten older, I've started getting keloid scars (raised, hard scars that grow beyond the original wound). Fortunately they're on my legs, so they're not too bad--but no more piercings for me! Unless I do the scarification thing, and I think I'll pass. But generally, given how clumsy I am, I'm not as banged up as I should be.
Number of things in my past that I regret: There's nothing I would specifically change--they were all important to how I am as a person now, I guess. Sometimes I wish that I had learned to trust and love more easily, but I guess there's still time for that. Oh, and I wish I'd realised that I could have had my grandmother's car put in my name after her death. Instead I just left it to be taken away because I didn't want anything more to do with my father once he tried to blackmail me. Long story. But now, I know you can get the title to an abandoned car. I went for years without one (and in fact, I'm back in that position now) and it made it difficult to get a job, etc. But I did okay, anyway, and maybe I needed that hardship. If you check out my excerpt for Nanowrimo, the introduction is autobiographical. I really did walk two miles in the dark every morning to make bagels. I'm just glad I went back to school before the infamous "Railway Killer" decided to use those train tracks as a hunting ground, because later on one man was killed and a woman was raped when the two were attacked by the serial killer, just a little way down the track. Shiver. But all in all, it's worked out--not well, exactly, but as needed. Zabet thinks I just haven't had much luck in life. I say I used it up not getting AIDS from one of the men I was with who was sexually addicted and having hundreds, if not thousands, of sexual encounters with men a year. Come to think of it, not being at the bagel shop at the wrong time was a lucky break, too. As long as my luck runs into the keeping me alive variety, I'm happy. :)

Well, I see I have a snoring dog at my feet (she fell asleep protecting her food, and just as I wrote those words she woke up and woofed at a passing cat). In her defence, she's not paranoid. They do steal her food. One is hovering as we speak--unfortunately for him, he does not realise the ingredients in both foods are the same. Muhahaha. Oh, gee. I think it's time to get some soda and curl up with a good book. I'm re-reading Elizabeth Peters' Die For Love which is a murder mystery set at a romance writer's convention. Then, hopefully this weekend, I'll work on my novel--I've been sadly neglecting it. I had the events of our cooperative story (a.k.a. the game) in mind, since we've been dealing with gun-toting cultists, etc. But if we don't game this weekend, the writing will help take care of my need to create mayhem.

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