Five Things You Might Not Know About Me

1. On the side of my Outlook Express account, there is a list of tasks that I make for myself. They range from the dull (Homework) to the bizarre (Be the Broccoli...don't ask) to the sublime (Kiss S.) Upon completion of this post I can tick off the "Meme - Five Things" task that has been there for months, annoying me.

2. I despise honey. I cannot abide the taste, smell, texture or sight of it...ugh. Even thinking about honey can make my stomach turn. I have no reason for this detestation, but it is sincere. S. was quite smug with himself when I ate a meal he had cooked that had a minute amount of honey in it - but I'll get him back someday. He has a bizarre dislike of cinnamon, after all...

3. All of my close friends live in this hamlet. I have no close friends from my childhood unless you count family members. This is something I don't tell people. I am ashamed of this, although it really wasn't my fault...I was a pretty isolated child. Still. It makes me feel like a bizarre aberration of nature.

4. Sunday will be the first day that anything I've written, and finished, will be shared with people that I cannot choose. It scares me and thrills me. It strikes me as strange, thinking about it now, that I have been writing for most of my life and yet haven't shared my writing with more than a handful of people - because I'm afraid, of course. Perhaps that isn't so bizarre after all.

5. A movie has to be really, really terrible for me not to get sucked into the story. Even a terrible movie will keep me enthralled - it's like the screen has a bizarre ability to hypnotize me within thirty seconds. This annoys me, because if a television is turned on I have a very difficult time focusing on the people around me. I would rather put my attention on the people, really - but it is very hard for me to do, and I'm not sure why.

6. I know this is supposed to be five, but yes - I did intentionally use the word bizarre in each one of those points. Ha ha!

Out of the Dust

Years ago, one of my aunts gave me a book called "Out of the Dust" by Karen Hesse. It is a story told in poetry and it is beautiful. I remembered that I loved it but I had forgotten how heartbreaking and perfect it was.

...and didn't notice how lonely she was
until she met Daddy and fell into the
big hurt of his eyes.

This sentence leaped out at me and almost made me cry.

Story really is a vital part of our human experience. I sometimes forget this.

I'm glad there are stories out there to remind me.

I'm back...

...and extremely jet-lagged.

But London was fun - if filled with smog that turned your nostrils grey after a day of sight-seeing (although that could have been all of the second-hand smoke...almost everyone there smoked but that could have been to protect themselves from the smog...it's a vicious circle).

I'll write all about it when I get my brain back from whatever magical land brains go to when they travel across time-zones.

But I would like to say that making me change to Beta when I'm so incoherent is extremely unjust.

At least I think that it is.

An Observation

People are incapable of stability.

Waiting for them to achieve stability is an exercise in futility.

Up, up and away!

This time Saturday I'll be flying to London.

I probably won't post much (if anything at all) while I'm over there...but I'll be back - and jet-lagged - on the 17th, so you'll hear from me for sure by the 21st (which is when I imagine my brain will be functioning again).

Pray for safety for me and my classmates. This is a school trip. Almost everyone who is important to me (outside of my family) is going to be along, which is cool.

I suppose along with a prayer for safety for me, you could add a prayer for peace of mind for my mother.