Lucky Seven

So, Walking Fine Art tagged me and I decided, for once in my life, to participate. So here are 49 things you may or may not know about me:

7 Things I Want to Do Before I Die
1. Travel the world
2. Build my dream house
3. Write a novel and have it published
4. Live in a foreign country
5. Get out of debt – and stay out
6. Be able to write with my left hand as well as I do with my right.
7. Get LASIK surgery

7 Things I Cannot Do
1. Eat anything that came from a cow
2. Handle spiders
3. Visit a Holocaust museum
4. Play an instrument
5. Wear orange
6. Give up dark chocolate
7. Tell my right from my left

7 Things That Attracted Me to George Clooney*
*I know it is supposed to be ‘My Spouse’ but I’m single and George is practically perfect in my book.
1. Um, have you seen him?
2. The mischeivious twinkle in his eyes that never disappears.
3. He spearheaded the Sept. 11th charity telethon and was also active with those put on for the 2005 Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina victims.
4. He refused to let Bill O’Reilly bully him and forced O’Reilly to put his money and his fame where his mouth was.
5. Really, check out Ocean’s 11. Yum.
6. He puts his money where his mouth is and finances/produces/directs etc. projects he believes in.
7. He and his father recently toured the Sudan on a fact-finding trip without Hollywood trappings in order to educate people on the horrors happening there of which America seems largely unaware.

7 Things I Often Say
1. S_______ S______, this is Scully. (Telephone greeting at work, I say it so often, I occasionally slip and say it when I’m at home)
2. That’s just crazy talk. (Usually said in my head in response to someone’s idea/request/demand at work. When I’m in a good mood. What I say when I’m in a bad mood would totally lower your opinion of me)
3. I need a nap.
4. Where’s my Secret Trust Fund!?! (One long-held fantasy, second only to George Clooney, involves some heretofore unknown relative leaving me a magnificently large inheritance)
5. Idiot! (Usually shouted at one of the many wretched drivers on the freeway, any time I see anyone on Fox News, and any time I hear someone from the Bush Administration speak about the war, the environment, the economy, national security, the global community, themselves, etc.)
6. No cheese.
7. What? (Because I have drifted off into FantasyLand and missed whatever just happened)

7 Books I Love
1. A Room With A View by E.M. Forster
2. Persuasion by Jane Austen (Well, pretty much anything by JA, but this is my fave)
3. Possession: A Romance by A.S. Byatt
4. About A Boy by Nick Hornby
5. Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
6. Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger
7. The Thursday Next Series by Jasper Fforde

7 Movies I Could Watch Over and Over
1. Charade
2. Rat Race
3. What’s Up Doc
4. Pride & Prejudice (with the caveat that I fast forward through any scene involving Mrs. Bennett.)
5. The Sting (Yummy Paul Newman, plus I always forget who knows what so it is always an adventure)
6. To Catch A Thief
7. Singin’ In The Rain

7 People I Would Like to Hear From
1. Esperanza
2. Miss Parker
3. CherBear
4. Katie
5. SJ
6. Panini (I know you have left the blogging world for a bit, but I’d still like to hear your answers)
7. My Mom (who doesn’t technically have a blog, but I’d still like to see her answers)

The FBL First Draft

So here is the list we compiled for the FBL. Feel free to keep making suggestions if we have missed someone.

Jensen Ackles, Naveen Andrews, Christian Bale, Orlando Bloom, Adrien Brody, Gerard Butler, Tom Cavanaugh, Kyle Chandler, George Clooney, Stephen Colbert, Sean Connery, Anderson Cooper, Bradley Cooper, John Cusack, Johnny Depp, David Duchovny, Jakob Dylan, Rupert Everett, Colin Firth, Cary Grant, Hugh Grant, Josh Holloway, Hugh Jackman, Gene Kelly, Will Kemp, John Krasinski, Ashton Kutcher, Hugh Laurie, Nicholas Lea, Dylan McDermott, Ewan McGregor, Viggo Mortensen, Dermot Mulroney, Paul Newman, Jeremy Northam, Edward Norton, Matthew Perry, Brad Pitt, Johnny Reznick, Michael Rosenbaum, Robert Smith, John Stamos, Jon Stewart, Rob Thomas, Michael Vartan, Goran Visnjic, Michael Weatherly, Michael T. Weiss, Tom Welling, Luke Wilson

Sorry it couldn't be illustrated, but I just don't have that kind of time or space.

The End of Possibility

Yesterday I found out that a friend from high school died last weekend. I don't even know if friend is the right word, as we traveled in different circles that occasionally overlapped. Maybe 'friendly' would be a better term. Additionally, I hadn't had contact with this person since graduation nine years ago, so I didn't think that it would have too great of an impact on my life. It is sad and I feel for his family, but it didn't alter my plans or cause any deep brooding. Until today.


At about eleven o'clock this morning, my Yahoo LAUNCHcast started playing a UB40 song and the fact of my friend's death hit me hard. I flashed back to a junior high field trip. My friend had brought a Discman or something similar and some speakers to attach it to and we listened to UB40's cover of Fools Rush In while we joked and laughed and whiled away the long hours until we reached home. I believe this was also the trip in which he and a friend had purchased a rubber chicken and then accidentally lit it on fire. The best part was the chaperones having no idea what had happened despite the rising level of panic and rancid burning smell coming from our section of the bus. While these memories rushed through my mind, I fought back tears, not so much because I had lost someone in my life, because he hadn't been a part of my life in almost a decade. But rather because of the loss of possibility. I will never be able to reconnect with my friend. He will be absent at our ten-year high school reunion next year. There will be no reminiscing about starting rubber chickens on fire or any of the other crazy things that adolescents do to avoid boredom. There will be no excitement at discovering what the intervening years have held for us. Time had run out. I had been betting against time and it won. Like it always does.