Tag: Quiz-Things

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Skills: I got ’em

Bill Altreuter points to this list of 75 things every man should be able to do, I guess, in order to be able to really lay claim to true manliness or something. Surprisingly, Bill doesn’t do what bloggers are supposed to do in such cases: reproduce the list, with specific comment on his ability, or lack thereof, to do the things on the list. Well, unto the breach I go!

1. Give advice that matters in one sentence. Sometimes you can do it with one sentence, sometimes you need more than that. I guess he’s saying that you need to be able to distinguish the one from the other. That’s not particularly earthshaking; don’t give a sermon when a sentence will do. Check. I can do that.

2. Tell if someone is lying. Well, for this you have to get to know each person, since each person has his or her own “tell”, right? An easier way is to know what you’re talking about before you ever talk about it. That way, no matter what someone tries telling you, you can tell the BS as soon as it starts to fly. But the guy in the article seems to be endorsing the “All liars do this” kind of thing, which is just silly. Watch Bill Clinton and George W. Bush: they don’t lie the same, do they?

3. Take a photo. I like to think I can do this, but it’s usually more a matter of trial and error than anything else. I like to point and shoot.

4. Score a baseball game. Well, I don’t know about this one. Sure, keeping score well requires and rewards a keen eye for the game’s inner workings, but does that really translate into something every man should be able to do? Really? I don’t think so.

5. Name a book that matters. Feh. Anybody can name a book, as the writer shows. I’d be more impressed if he could tell us why he thinks that The Catcher in the Rye does not matter. Hell, we’d better start with clearing up just what it means for a book to “matter” anyway. If he’s saying that you should be well-read, well, duh. But if he’s saying that there’s some esoteric secret knowledge of what is truly good that can only be found by reading the books that “matter”, well, that’s where I get off the crazy train.

6. Know at least one musical group as well as is possible. I kinda-sorta agree, although I don’t like the way he frames this to only include music done by “groups”. Why not knowing a composer or songwriter as well as is possible?

7. Cook meat somewhere other than the grill. Sure. But why limit this idea to just meat? A man should know how to render bacon, to cook eggs to order in all degrees of doneness, to make a roux and know how to use it, to cook perfect pasta, and to be able to do all of these things with only a good set of knives and a good set of pots and pans.

8. Not monopolize the conversation. Why should this be a thing men should know how to do? I’d extend this to everybody.

9. Write a letter. Yup. I do this very well, and I wish I’d find time to do it more often. Maybe we should come up with a Blogistan-based letter exchange of some sort?

10. Buy a suit. I wouldn’t have the faintest idea how to go about buying a suit. I’d find a decent haberdashery, though – an independent place that’s been around for many years, hopefully even decades, with the ownership in its second or third generation, and then I’d put my shoulders back and say, “I need a suit and I have absolutely no idea how to buy one.”

11. Swim three different strokes. I’m covered. I can swim freestyle, backstroke, and breast stroke; I can do a butterfly stroke if ordered to, although if my life depended on executing the fundamentals of the stroke with any degree of proficiency above that of a purely recreational swimmer, I’d be screwed. I can also do that weird underwater thing that Patrick Duffy did on The Man from Atlantis, which actually works but looks really weird.

12. Show respect without being a suck-up. Sure.

13. Throw a punch. Well, OK. Or, know how to avoid situations where punching would be a useful skill.

14. Chop down a tree. What kind of tree? If you’re taking down something small, the size of a Christmas tree, fine. But if this guy’s suggesting that you should know how to bring down that three-hundred-year old oak in your backyard, that’s just silly. Call the professionals.

15. Calculate square footage. Everybody should know how to do this, right? Moving on:

16. Tie a bow tie. No. Sorry, but if you want to wear a bow tie, then learn. Otherwise, who cares?

17. Make one drink, in large batches, very well. I’m genuinely not sure what the point of this is. What if your one drink is one that isn’t very popular with the people you’re having over? This one is just silly.

18. Speak a foreign language. Everybody should be able to do this. I can’t, except for an extremely basic comprehension of French left over from my high school days.

19. Approach a woman out of his league. To what purpose, exactly? Conversation? A trip to her home? I’ve never been the type to approach people I don’t know, anyway.

20. Sew a button. Another skill everybody should have.

21. Argue with a European without getting xenophobic or insulting soccer. OK, although the soccer thing is off the table if they bring it up. Then, it’s fair game. Especially if they take after baseball.

22. Give a woman an orgasm so that he doesn’t have to ask after it. Wait a minute: there are guys who ask after it? A better rule would be, “Never ask. Period.”

23. Be loyal. To what? And don’t be unquestioningly loyal. And if you’re in a position of authority and responsibility, reward loyalty rather than demanding it.

24. Know his poison, without standing there, pondering like a dope. Sure.

25. Drive an eightpenny nail into a treated two-by-four without thinking about it. Yup – and afterwards, use a nail set to drive the head below the surface of the wood.

26. Cast a fishing rod without shrieking or sighing or otherwise admitting defeat. I’m not sure if this is something every man should be able to do, but maybe that’s just because I’ve never gone fishing in my life. There, I said it.

27. Play gin with an old guy. I don’t know about gin; seems any such game would do. Like chess.

28. Play go fish with a kid. Again, why make it game-specific? Any game will do, as long as you keep up with the kid’s age by not playing Candyland with a fifth-grader. (Besides, as I’ve mentioned before, aside from the shuffle of the deck, there is no element of chance at all in Candyland.)

29. Understand quantum physics well enough that he can accept that a quarter might, at some point, pass straight through the table when dropped. Sure. And be able to talk about evolution, plate tectonics, and astronomy. Be able to pick out constellations and name some stars.

30. Feign interest. I confess that I’m not terribly good at this. If the topic at hand is not interesting me, I can’t keep my eyes from going all glassy.

31. Make a bed. I can do this. I never actually do this, but I can, which I guess is the important thing. Bed-making has never struck me as being a terribly useful or important thing, unless one is having company.

32. Describe a glass of wine in one sentence without using the terms nutty, fruity, oaky, finish, or kick. This ability goes beyond wine: if you can describe wine in more poetic terms than talking about how oaky it is on your palate, then you can probably also describe the way your co-worker’s pale orange sweater reminds you of the sky just before sunrise on the first day of summer.

33. Hit a jump shot in pool. Meh. Or, just don’t play pool or assume that people give a crap about how good at pool you are.

34. Dress a wound. For God’s sake, everybody should be able to do this.

35. Jump-start a car (without any drama). Change a flat tire (safely). Change the oil (once). OK, that’s three things, which is cheating. But anybody should be able to do this, too.

36. Make three different bets at a craps table. Oh, come on. I think this writer is making some pretty liberal assumptions as to the universality of his personal interests as applied to all men. Knowing how to make three different bets at a craps table is of no more use to me than being able to load a reel-to-reel tape deck. Less, even, since I have hobbies that could conceivably lead to me threading a reel-to-reel tape deck if I took them far enough.

37. Shuffle a deck of cards. Again, everybody should be able to passably randomize the deck.

38. Tell a joke. Maybe, maybe not. There are lots of people I know who are terribly witty and funny and who yet cannot tell a joke. If you can’t, accept it and just don’t make the attempt.

39. Know when to split his cards in blackjack. There he goes again. Not all men are regulars at the tables in Vegas.

40. Speak to an eight-year-old so he will hear. Or she.

41. Speak to a waiter so he will hear. Again, or she. Also, always remember that just because they’re being paid to serve you doesn’t make them your servants.

42. Talk to a dog so it will hear. Huh? Really: huh?!

43. Install: a disposal, an electronic thermostat, or a lighting fixture without asking for help. Sure.

44. Ask for help. Absolutely.

45. Break another man’s grip on his wrist. Sure, why not?

46. Tell a woman’s dress size. I can’t imagine why this ability would be useful, much less so useful as to universalized to all men.

47. Recite one poem from memory. Don’t stop at one. Know lots of poems. Song lyrics, too, but the good songs by the good songwriters. Especially if you have any inclinations toward writing.

48. Remove a stain. I’d extend this to being able to do laundry without ruining stuff.

49. Say no. Not a skill I’ve been blessed with, sadly enough.

50. Fry an egg sunny-side up. Or any other way, really. “Over easy” doesn’t actually mean “flip it over and cook it to death”.

51. Build a campfire. Another skill everybody should have, probably.

52. Step into a job no one wants to do. That’s the entire nature of my current job.

53. Sometimes, kick some ass. OK, I suppose.

54. Break up a fight. This has never come up for me, so I don’t know.

55. Point to the north at any time. Always useful. At night, be able to pick out the North Star.

56. Create a play-list in which ten seemingly random songs provide a secret message to one person. OK, now here’s a skill I’ve got in spades. I make terrific play-lists.

57. Explain what a light-year is. I can do this. I can also explain a parsec and offer all manner of BS rationales why Han Solo wasn’t full of crap.

58. Avoid boredom. One step might be to stop reading this blog! (Kidding, of course. This blog rocks.)

59. Write a thank-you note. This is a skill for everybody, not just men.

60. Be brand loyal to at least one product. For me? Yuengling Lager, Ben&Jerry’s ice cream, Captain Morgan’s spiced rum, Cockburn’s Ruby Port, Rishi green tea.

61. Cook bacon. This falls under my category above of being able to cook lots of stuff. I don’t believe in “flat” bacon, though: I like my bacon all twisted and curly, the way it gets when done on the stove in a pan. Especially if the bacon is for use in a BLT, because then the bacon curls on itself on the sandwich to make double thicknesses of bacony goodness.

62. Hold a baby. Sigh….

63. Deliver a eulogy. I don’t know that I could deliver one, but I know I can write one.

64. Know that Christopher Columbus was a son of a bitch. OK, you have to click through above to read the writer’s larger rationale on this one, but I think it holds for everyone.

65-67. Throw a baseball over-hand with some snap. Throw a football with a tight spiral. Shoot a 12-foot jump shot reliably. Meh. Everybody should be able to demonstrate the fundamentals of whatever sport it is that’s their “thing”, but doing these three things specifically? Again, meh. (probably because I suck at basketball.)

68. Find his way out of the woods if lost. A definite. I wandered off a trail once in Allegany State Park, but finding my way back to “civilization” was a fairly easy matter of continuing to always head downhill until I reached a road.

69. Tie a knot. Another one for everybody. One or two kinds of knots is fine, though, unless you’re a sailor or someone who really wants to know lots of nautical stuff.

70. Shake hands. Lord, yes! You don’t have to crush the other guy’s hand – it’s not a contest of strength, after all – but really, nothing’s worse than a guy with a limp handshake. There really are few things I think are acceptable for women that aren’t for a man, but a limp handshake is one of them.

71. Iron a shirt. Yup, this is useful.

72. Stock an emergency bag for the car. Another one for everybody, not just men. And “beer” does not count as an emergency item. If stocking an emergency bag for winter, don’t forget candles and a large tin can, like a coffee can; a fat candle burning in a tin can puts out a surprising amount of heat. And a gun, with one bullet for each member of your party. (Oh, come on. I’m kidding about that one. Jeebus!)

73. Caress a woman’s neck. Oh, yes. And speak the language of love! (Not French, either.)

74. Know some birds. I’d extend this to knowing birds and trees and rocks, to an extent. Nature walks and hikes are more rewarding if you’re able to appreciate your surroundings on a deeper level than “Oooooh, pretty!”

75. Negotiate a better price. I dread large purchases, because I have little tolerance for haggling, little ability for haggling, and I don’t have a hell of a lot of sales resistance, either.

I don’t know what this all means about me. Aside from the goofy gambling stuff, most of this is stuff that everybody should know how to do, right?

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Ye Olde Quizze Masterre

Two quizzes from SamuraiFrog, here and here. The first looks familiar, but I’ve been doing these for so long, I’ve probably already done it at some point. Maybe I’ll seek that out and, if I did do it, compare answers. Or not.

1.Name: Real name, Kelly; Internet handle, “Jaquandor”

2. Nicknames: None, really.

3. Feet size: 11, although that can vacillate a bit depending on the brand of shoe in question.

4. Do you have a crush: Sela Ward, as always; and I have the feeling that my long-dormant crush on Gillian Anderson’s about to come back in a BIG way.

5. Girlfriend/Boyfriend: Wife.

6. Age you act: Twelve, probably. That’s the true Golden Age of Science Fiction.

7. Where Do You Live: Orchard Park, NY, which is a suburb of Buffalo.

8. Where you want to live: Anyplace in Southern Erie County. I love this whole region so damn much.

9. Birthplace: Pittsburgh, PA

10. Favorite Salad Dressing: Extra-virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

11. Ever gone skinny dipping? Heavens, no. Swimming clothed, yes, but in the buff? Believe me, nobody wants that.

12. What are you watching? PBS, because I’m that friggin’ cultured. (OK, fine, I’m not watching PBS. I’m sitting at my desk writing this; The Wife is watching Deal or No Deal.)

13. Last person you talked to: Either The Wife or The Daughter, within the last fifteen minutes or so. Or maybe one of the cats. I don’t remember the last thing I said.

14. Favorite movie: Star Wars, duh!

15. Favorite Book: The Lord of the Rings or The Lions of Al-Rassan.

16. Favorite Type of music: Classical, film music, and Celtic.

17. Favorite types of cars: The ones we haven’t invented yet that don’t run on gasoline because even though we’ve known for decades that we’d eventually reach this point we decided to be lazy about it all.

18. Favorite Saying: I say “We can only hope” a lot. My best friend likes to poke fun at me for saying that.

19. Favorite Fast Food: A jumbo all-beef from Ted’s Hot Dogs or a Super Mighty from Mighty Taco. (I don’t consider pizza a fast food.)

20. Favorite Ice Cream: Coffee Haagen-Dasz, although I haven’t had it in many moons.

21. Favorite Alcoholic Drink: Just one? I can’t pick. Big fan of rum, Southern Comfort, red wine, and various beers.

22. When Do You Go To Sleep: Generally between 11 and midnight.

23. Most Embarrassing Moment: It’s so hard to pick just one, sadly. There was this time I…no, never mind.

24. Stupidest Person you know: “Myself,” he answered, displaying his famous diplomatic aplomb.

25. Funniest Person you know: The Daughter is always good for a laugh or two.

27. Favorite Food: Pizza, I suppose.

28. Favorite Song: I couldn’t possibly name a single favorite, but it would probably be a Lerner-and-Loewe song if I could. So picking one at random, oh, “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” from My Fair Lady.

29. Favorite Television Show: The Office, Grey’s Anatomy, Hell’s Kitchen.

30. Favorite Radio Station: WNED, Buffalo’s classical station.

31. Favorite junk food: Savory: burgers. Sweet: chocolate chip cookies.

32. Favorite sappy love song: For some reason, I really like “Inside Your Heaven”, sung by Carrie Underwood. It was her first single after winning American Idol.

33. Favorite Drink: Water.

34. Favorite article of clothing: You’re kidding, right?

35. Favorite Animal: The orca.

36. School: Went to a few.

37. How Many Kids You Want: The one I have, and the ones I lost.

38. What Kind Of Job: Maintenance.

39. Wedding song: “Unchained Melody”. I would have preferred “Reflections of Passion” by Yanni, but there’s nothing wrong with the Righteous Brothers. (Yes, I said Yanni. Shut up.)

40. Pets: Two dumb cats and one cat that’s marginally smarter.

41. 5 years from now? Published?

42. 10 years from now? Published, happy, healthy.

Have You Ever…?

1. Done Drugs: Only by prescription. Illegal stuff, no.

2. Run Away From Home: No. I had no idea where I’d go.

3. Hit A Girl: No. I don’t see anything more inherently wrong with hitting a woman than hitting a man; I just think that hitting people is generally a bad thing.

4. Lied: Sure. Not proud of any of them, but sometimes you have to and sometimes you don’t.

5. Stolen Anything: In my idiotic youth, yes. Since then, just the occasional marker or pack of post-its from the office supply room.

6. Broken A Bone: I broke my collar bone in seventh grade when a local bully pushed me off my bike. Should I ever meet him again, I plan to break both of his collar bones, among some other less essential parts of him.

7. Cheated On A Test: Yeah, once or twice. Not terribly proud of that, either.

8. Cheated On A girlfriend/boyfriend: Never, not once.

9. Gotten Drunk: Yup. Not in a long time. I used to enjoy the occasional drunkenness, but last time I got good and plowed, I decided that I just didn’t like the feeling anymore.

10. Been With Two guys/girls At Once: Huh?! What?! I’ve gotta be honest here: I find the whole menage a trois notion pretty repellent.

11. Been In The Hospital: For myself? No, except a couple of trips to the emergency room as a kid to have a broken bone set and another time when I needed tetanus shots after an unfortunate encounter involving my kayak and a barbed wire fence. (No, I’m not making that up.)

12. Let a friend cry on your shoulder: This is what shoulders are for.

13. Fell asleep in the shower/bath: No, but I’ve nodded off in the hot tub before. (My parents’ hot tub, actually. As if we own a hot tub.)

14. Gone to Church: Yes, on most Sundays.

15. Never slept during a night: Does this mean, pulling an all-nighter? Aside from a couple of cross-country drives during the college years, only once, and that had nothing to do with studying.

16. Ever been on a motorcycle or motorbike: No. They look fun, but I think I’d be terrified in one.

17. Been to a camp: Yup, the Bristol Hills Music Camp. Two years as a camper, two as a counselor. What a great time.

18. Sat in a restaurant w/o ordering: No.

19. Seen someone die: Nope, I missed that fine honor by about an hour.

20. Gone a week w/out shaving: Well, I’ve had a beard since a month or two after I started working at The Store, so yeah.

21. Didn’t wash your hair for a week: Ewwww!

22. Broken something valuable: I don’t offhand recall ever breaking anything valuable, but I’ve broken things that were of enormous sentimental value to me.

23. Thought you were in love: As opposed to actually being in love? That’s kind of a weird distinction, isn’t it? Anyway, I’m always in love.

24. Streaked the streets: No. And there’s a reason for that.

25. Screamed at someone for no reason: Doesn’t everybody?

26. Said I love you and meant it: Otherwise it’s just words, isn’t it?

27. Been hurt by a guy/girl you loved: Those are the hurts that hurt the most.

28. Stayed up till 4 am on the phone: No, since I generally don’t like talking on the phone. But I’m open to the possibility.

29. Pulled a prank: Yes, but I’m pretty much of a low-grade pranker, and when I prank someone, I usually stand there grinning like an idiot until they discover the prank, and then I take full credit for it. I’m not the type for obscure or mean pranks left unidentified.

Which Is Better…?

1. Coke Or Pepsi: I have no real preference between the two, to be honest. By default we get Pepsi more than Coke because The Wife strongly prefers Pepsi, but I don’t much care.

2. Cats Or Dogs: Cats. Duh. But a nice, big dog would be nice someday. Like Murray in Mad About You; he was a fun dog. No stupid little dogs for me, though: if the sound your dog makes can be honestly represented by the word “yip”, then it’s not a dog. You’ve got yourself a rodent. (Actually, I’d probably get a dog and then be horribly disappointed when he turns out to not actually be Satchel from Get Fuzzy.)

3. DVDs or VHS: Is this an option anymore? I love the DVDs, and I’m annoyed that now Blu-Ray is getting pushed down our throat.

4. Deaf Or Blind: If I had to pick one? I guess I’d rather be blind than deaf, because I never want to lose the ability to hear music. But to never again see the faces of certain people? That would also crush my heart like a walnut.

5. Pools Or Hot Tubs: I enjoy swimming. I also enjoy soaking in hot tubs.

6. Television Or Radio: Two different things for two different places, really. I like both.

7. CDs Or mp3: MP3s have lots of advantages for convenience, and I have to admit that it’s the way of the future. But I’m still not entirely happy with the idea of divorcing content from the physical storage medium. Hard drives aren’t as rigorous as CDs, and that’s that.

8. Apples or oranges: Honestly, I love both. I eat an orange nearly every day at work with lunch, and I tend to eat several apples a week. My apple consumption goes up toward the fall when the fresh harvest starts rolling in. (BTW, who out there actually likes the Red Delicious apple? I’ve never yet met a person who claims that as their preferred apple.)

9. Strawberries or Blueberries: I adore strawberries, but I couldn’t live without blueberries.

10. Gold or silver: Gold.

11. Vanilla or chocolate: Chocolate. Rich, dark chocolate. With nuts, or without nuts. With mint filling, without. Or with peanut butter. Or with no filling at all, that 72% cacao stuff that is so dark and chocolatey it’s as if the gods of chocolate have bestowed their favor upon you for one brief second. (But you know what? For all my deep dear love of chocolate, I also think that vanilla is a very underrated flavor of its own. There are few pleasures in the hottest summertime better than a bowl of good vanilla bean ice cream with some fresh blueberries on top.)

12. Video or Movie: Depends, but usually it’s a DVD at home.

13. Park or Beach: Parks these days, but I’d love to go to a beach again and feel the sand between my toes. We used to go to the beach frequently as a kid, during the years when we lived near Portland, OR. There are beaches on Lake Erie, but for some reason we never much get to them. I’m not sure why. I do love the seashore, though; there’s something elemental when I’m standing on the edge of the ocean, something that calls to me. (I think it’s the kraken.)

14. Hot or Cold weather: Given a choice between heat and cold, I take cold. I don’t like heat. But who knows? Maybe as I get smaller, that will change.

15. Sunset or Sunrise: Sunset.

When is the Last Time You…?

1. Took a shower: About three hours ago.

2. Cried: It’s been a few days, oddly enough. I’m probably due.

3. Watched a Disney movie: Hmmm. Been a few days on that, too.

4. Given/gotten a hug: When The Wife got home from work.

5. Been to the movies: Now that has been a while – Enchanted, maybe? We don’t get to the movies much at the theater, because it’s just too expensive to do regularly anymore. That seems to me a pity, since I love sitting in a theater and watching a movie.

6. Danced: I only dance when I’m alone, because I’m very, very bad at it. I think. I’d love to learn Irish step dancing, though, as a project for some unspecified time in the future when my chest more resembles Michael Flatly’s than Tom Arnold’s.

7. Did a survey like this: Sometimes I think that surveys like this are the only reason this blog exists!

What Is…?

1. Your Fondest Memory Of This Year: Tom Brady’s slumped shoulders after the Super Bowl.

2. Your Most Prized Possession: I suppose the laptop.

3. The Thing That Makes You The Happiest: When I try to make someone smile, and it works.

4. Your Favorite Food For Breakfast: On a normal day, frosted shredded wheat with blueberries on top, with OJ. On a spectacular day, pancakes or waffles.

5. Your Favorite Food For Dinner: If they could invent a pill to counteract all its ill effects, I could probably eat pizza every night. But I also love Chinese. And burgers. And salads topped with chicken or tuna. Or black bean stew. Or chili. Or macaroni and cheese, the way I make it homemade with shell pasta and pork sausage.

6. Your Favorite Slow Song: Sam Cooke, “Wonderful World”. The Platters, “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes”. Blackmore’s Night, “The Village Lanterne”. Van Halen, “Love Walks In”. Ben E. King, “Stand By Me”. I could go on.

7. Your Ideal BF/GF: One who’s smart, caring, strong, fun to talk to, one who encourages my good insanities and discourages my bad ones, one who thinks I’m not ugly. I lucked out.

What Do You Feel About…?

1. Bill Clinton: I miss his Presidency, but the current campaign isn’t doing his image any favors.

2. Love at First Sight: Yes. And no. A sight can point to a possibility, I think, but not actually the real thing. For that, you need interaction.

3. Abortion: The ugly truth is that unless medical technology gets to the point where we can literally gestate fetuses in artificial wombs all the way from conception, and unless that technology is freely available to all women, we’re always going to have abortion. Thus, I think it should be legal and safe.

4. Smoking: One of the nastier things we’ve invented for ourselves, and I really don’t have much sympathy for the smokers who complain about cigarette taxes and that they can’t smoke in bars anymore. If you don’t like the expense, then quit.

5. Death: Not a big fan.

6. Rap: I don’t think it’s artless noise, but it’s not my cup of tea, either. I’m a bit dismayed by the violent nature of the rap “culture”, though.

7. Marilyn Manson: I don’t know anything about him, but my general impression is that he’s pretty lame.

8. Premarital Sex: See, this is one of those things that depends on the situation. I’ve never understood the “casual hookup” kind of thing that happens between two people who literally met three hours before at some bar. But otherwise…I don’t really care what consenting adults do.

9. Suicide: I’m reminded of Hannibal Lecter’s line about a patient of his who met a grisly demise: “Best thing for him, really. His therapy was going nowhere.” Suicide can sometimes seem like a cowardly thing to do, for those of us on the outside of the suicidal person’s head, and that’s the problem, isn’t it: courage, bravery, and cowardice are internal qualities. None of us knows what’s in another’s head and heart, so it’s awfully hard to pass judgment on those whose lives have taken them to a place where the only option they can find for themselves is to embrace death. Suicide, to me, represents the ultimate in mental illnesses, when the very part of us that craves life has been overridden.

And yes, I do believe there are times when death can, and should, be among one’s options.

Wow, that got pretty heavy there at the end, didn’t it? So, in the interests of lightening the mood, here’s that old bunny with the pancake on its head!

Hee hee, bunny with the pancake on its head. That’s comedy gold!

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The hyphen: is there anything it can’t do?

OK, I was tagged by Blue Girl with this. It’s a one-word answer quiz-thing. I’m never all that good at one-word answer stuff; I do best with lots-of-word answers. But let’s see how I do, eh?

(BTW, I wrote this on Thursday night and saved it, so some of the answers are incomprehensible if you don’t know that I was watching NBC’s Thursday night roster of comedies at the time.)

Yourself: Wondering.

Your Partner: Beloved.

Your Hair: Long

Your Mother: Librarian

Your Father: Logical

Your Favorite Item: Laptop!

Your Dream Last Night: Sensual (Well, it was! So there!)

Your Favorite Drink: Water

Your Dream Home: Bag-end (A loophole, I’ve found! Thank you, O magical hyphen!)

The Room You Are In: Book-filled

Your Fear: McCain

Where Do You Want to be in 10 years: There

Who You Hung Out With Last Night: Daughter

What You Are Not: Thin

Muffins: Lemon-poppyseed (I had to cheat there, that’s my favorite muffin flavor!)

One of Your Wish Items: Prius

Time: Incessant

Last Thing You Did: Ate

What You Are Wearing: Sweatshirt (Ahhh! You all thought I’d say something else!)

Your Favorite Weather: Autumnal

Your Favorite Book: Tolkien’s

Last Thing You Ate: Casserole

Your Mood: Pooped….

Your Best Friends: Beloved

What Are You Thinking About Right Now: Fey (As in, Tina.)

Your Car: Grannymobile

Your Summer: Hot

What’s on your TV: 30Rock (hence my answer three questions up)

What Is Your Weather Like: Chill

When Was the Last Time You Laughed: Michael-versus-Stanley (again, no way to do this one without resorting to Mr. Hyphen.)

What is your relationship status: Blessed

And there we go. That was fun. I’m not going to tag anyone, just grab-and-go, folks!

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Exxxx-celent!

According to not one but two bloggers — Lynn Sislo and Steph Waller — this blog is Excellent! Ha! In your face, Flanders! But now I have to identify some other “Excellent” blogs, and here’s the thing: they all stink. Ha! I’m the only one!

OK, I’m kidding there. Here are some real nominations. (I’ll avoid any common nominations, but I’ll note that of the blogs on Lynn’s and Steph’s lists than I know, they are, in fact, excellent. I’ll also not nominate those who nominated me, although both Lynn and Steph are excellent with a capital X.)

:: In terms of blogging, Sir Matthew Jones the Indestructible, who blogs at A Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy, is like one of those comatose people who slumbers for a year or more and then awakes for a few days, talks constantly about anything and everything, and then goes dormant once again. (This is because he’s got one of them “important jobs” and a “social life”, enemies numbers One and Two for regular blogging.) He’s currently enjoying a burst of blogging activity, so if you’re into first-class geekitude, get thee hence. (Matt and I have known each other since fifth grade, way back in 1981, so aside from my direct family members, I’ve known him longer than anybody.)

:: Angela Martini is hard to pin down. She is an illustrator who lives in New York City, and she spreads her content over multiple websites, some of which are infrequently-updated blogs and some of which are not. She’s most active on Flickr, though, and her posting regularity there, combined with her own comment on her photos, is very blog-like. She’s a lovely person, she wears overalls, and I’m supremely jealous of her hair. (Yeah, I said it. Many a photo she’s posted makes me think, “Wow, I wonder how I get my hair to do that!” A good example is here.)

:: Jeff of Psychosomatic Wit is a guy who really puts his heart out there, for all to see. His type of blogging takes a bit of bravery to do. (He’s also in a rough spot right now, which had been a long time coming and which had been hoped by all of his regular readers to not be coming at all.

:: Another terrific source of high-quality geekitude, Jason at Simple Tricks and Nonsense always brings the goods. Sometimes we agree on stuff, sometimes we don’t.

:: Blue Girl in a Red State mostly writes short-and-sweet posts: small glimpses into a life that all add up, the more you read.

:: The Sheila Variations is the kind of blog I wish this one could be, if I was a bit more fearless in my posting and a hell of a lot better read.

:: All Things Jennifer is a Buffalo blog that’s the kind of thing I most like to read: it’s about someone living their life in Buffalo. Not a whole lot of “Here’s why New York State/Erie County/City of Buffalo politics are Teh Suck”, just a whole lot of life.

:: What I said about All Things Jennifer? Ditto for Erin Go Blog.

That’s all the ones I’m picking for now. But there are tons that I could choose, and I probably will, next time this thing rolls ’round again!

(Image of Montgomery Burns snagged from here, after a Google image search)

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Six Things!!!

A short while back, Will Duquette tagged me with the “Six Things” meme thing, which is just like the venerable “Seven Things” meme thing, except that this time it’s “Six Things”. So I’m supposed to come up with six things about me. This gets harder each time it comes around; six years of bloggorhea will do that to you. I’m more and more hard-pressed to discuss stuff that I don’t discuss here, and that would be too horrifying for words. So here are six things about me, and if I repeat anything from a former iteration of this particular meme-thing, well, you might want to consider finding another blog to memorize!

:: It scares me that I’m well-versed enough on the show Saved By the Bell to say with some conviction that I think Tori was cuter than Kelly Kapowski.

(BTW, according to IMDb’s SBtB page, Lisa Turtle actually appeared in six more episodes than Zack Morris! How did that happen?!)

(Also BTW, Mark-Paul Gosselar was really quite effective in his role on NYPD Blue. I never once looked at him on that show and thought about Zack Morris.)

:: The closest I ever came to pulling an all-nighter in college was staying up until 6:00 am. This was not to finish a project, a paper, or study for a test. It was a Friday night and we were drinking beer and watching movies until 4:00, when one of us (I don’t remember if it was me or my room-mate) said, “Hey, we should watch The Wall now.”

:: As a function of a movie’s actual quality compared with my expectations going into it, I found Highlander 2: The Quickening far less disappointing than the original Highlander. I expected the former to be a steaming bowl of suck, and thus was able to kind of have fun with it, while the original had been so built up in my mind by a bunch of friends of mine who were huge fans of it that when I finally watched it I thought, “That’s it?”

(Clancy Brown, though, rules in any number of ways.)

:: I wish somebody would make a paper bag large enough for a human to crawl inside, so I could see just what it is that cats love so much about getting inside paper bags. Then I’d like to have another person jump on top of the paper bag while I’m inside the paper bag, just like the cats do.

:: I was very glad when The Daughter outgrew CandyLand, because it always bugged me that aside from the shuffling of the deck, that game has no element of chance whatsoever.

:: My favorite chain restaurant dessert of all time is the apple pie at Don Pablo’s, which I’m unlikely to ever get to eat again since the chain no longer exists in Western New York (hmmm, I wonder if it exists at all?). They would serve the slice of pie on a sizzling hot skillet, and it would be drenched in a hot brandy sauce and then topped with a scoop of ice cream. It was wonderful stuff, truly wonderful.

OK, that’s that. Who to tag? Hmmmmm.

Still thinkin’. Hmmmm. Well, tag yourselves, folks!

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Go away, or I shall quiz you a second time!

I saw this at Paul’s place, and of course I made no effort to resist it. Because resistance is futile.

Your best friend tells you she is pregnant. What is your reaction?

“Congratulations”, I suppose, although I’d have to work hard to conceal my astonishment, given what I know of her life situation. Actually, it would take me a few minutes to get to “Congratulations”. My immediate reaction would more likely be, “Gwaaahhh?!”

When is the last time you wanted to punch someone in their face?

With my fists? Not in a great long while, years, in fact; I don’t like fighting. With something else, though? and not in anger? Well, I’m always open to possibilities.

What is the last thing you spent money on?

My lunch today [Explanatory aside: I wrote this post on Thursday night and saved it until today.]: a piece of pizza, a couple of chicken fritters, and a medium Sierra Mist. I almost always drink water with my meals, but for some reason I was in the mood for some sweet, sweet carbonation today.

Do you think you gained or lost weight this past month?

I lost, you’d better believe it. I haven’t checked the overalls straps lately, but I discovered the other day that I have officially dropped a pants size.

Crunchy or Puffy Cheetos?

Puffy, although I do like the Crunchy once in a while. One of my great, great vices is Cheetos. Hand me a bag, and you won’t get the bag back until it contains naught but a few grains of Cheeto dust.

(BTW, it will forever break my heart that Planters Cheez Balls no longer exist. My God, I loved those things.)

Congratulations! You just had a son. What’s his name?

Quinn Jacob.

Congratulations! You just had a daughter. What’s her name?

Fiona Quinn. (Our plan was always to have Fiona carry her lost older brother’s name with her. Little did we know what her own destiny would turn out to be.)

What are you craving right now?

Pie.

What was the last thing you cried about?

The end of Juno. I’m not sure why.

When you buy something and your change is 2 cents, do you keep it or tell the cashier to keep it?

I almost always take my change. When I get home it goes into a jar, and when the jar gets to be a certain degree of fullness, I empty the change into the CoinStar machine at The Store. (I know, CoinStar keeps a small percentage of my money, but to me that’s worth it to avoid the drudgery of rolling my own change. I hate rolling change.)

What color is your tissue box?

Umm…er…it’s a Pirates of the Caribbean tie-in box of Kleenex, with photos of the lead characters.

Do you have a ceiling fan in your room, and if so, is there dust on that fan?

No ceiling fans in the current incarnation of Casa Jaquandor, which I find a bummer. I love ceiling fans.

Scariest thing you’ve experienced in the last year?

The Wife’s hospitalization, the loss of Baby Fiona, and the aftermath of all that, which went far longer and deeper than I had thought possible even at the time. In fact, it’s still going on.

Do you wear a name tag at work?

Yes, and it has my name on it. Cool, eh? (I tend to be pretty bad with names, and I’m constantly forgetting the names of people who introduce themselves to me. It’s really for the best that I work in a place where nametags are worn.)

Have you ever had a garage sale?

When I was living with my parents, yes. Since then, no, although I’ve moved some old stuff of mine on eBay, which is nothing more than a garage sale writ large.

What color is your iPod?

Clear, so I can’t find the damn thing. Oh wait, I can’t find it because I don’t own one. Crud. (I would like to get some kind of digital music player sometime, obviously; it doesn’t necessarily have to be an iPod.)

What is the last alcoholic beverage you had?

Caffeine-free Pepsi with Southern Comfort. [Updating note: I bought a case of Labatt’s yesterday. I haven’t sipped a Labatt’s in years, but for a long time it was my favorite beer.]

Are you happy right now?

I’m sitting in my armchair (which is quite old and in need of replacing, but still, it’s my armchair), writing answers to a blog quiz on my laptop while watching The Celebrity Apprentice (yeah, I’m still hooked on this show). I’m decked out in overalls and a favorite old sweatshirt, I’ve had a yummy salad for dinner with a glass of red wine, and I’ve just finished the afore-mentioned Pepsi and Southern Comfort. So yeah, right now I’m happy.

Who came over last?

Well, my sister visited last week, although we just met for dinner and she didn’t see Casa Jaquandor, but that’s who. At that time I gave her her much-belated Christmas presents (books by Guy Gavriel Kay and Christopher Moore, copies of the LOTR complete scores, and a few other knickknacks).

Do you drink beer?

Certainly. Beer is a wonderful thing. (When it comes to drinking, I’m pretty much of a lightweight. An eighteen year old girl in October of her freshman year at Ohio State could drink me under the table within an hour.)

Have your brothers or sisters ever told you that you were adopted?

I’m sure that something of that nature was said at one point or another; we expended the typical amount of energy that siblings expend in saying mean stuff to one another over the years. I don’t remember it specifically, though.

What is your favorite key on your key chain?

My favorite key? Huh? That’s pretty odd, innit?

What was the last movie you watched at home?

We all watched The Living Daylights.

What is in your pocket?

Right now? Nothing. But I had my cell phone in my pocket a while back.

(Not that anyone asked or anything, but here’s something a bit odd: Despite my love of overalls, I never carry stuff in the bib pocket. I hate having stuff up there. Makes me feel top-heavy.)

Where do you hurt?

My feet are always a bit sore toward the end of my work week.

Has someone ever made you a Build-A-Bear?

For me? No, but we took The Daughter there once. She didn’t quite grasp the concept at first, and became freaked out when she picked up the unstuffed carcass of a unicorn.

What’s something fun you did today?

I read some of Alice in Sunderland (review forthcoming after I finish it, but if the remaining three-fourths of the book are as brilliant as the first quarter, wow). I went with The Family to the library and to 7-11 for drinks (where I also sprang for a SlimJim for each of us). And then I read some of my favorite blogs.

What is your favorite aisle at Wal-Mart?

I never shop at Wal-Mart unless I am looking for something I literally can’t find anyplace else, and that never happens. I can’t stand Wal-Mart. I don’t like them as a company to begin with, and the Wal-Marts in this area (except two that are too far away to be of any use on a regular basis) are too dirty for pleasant shopping.

When is your birthday?

September. I share my birthday with George Gershwin, which makes me happy. You may all start saving for my presents now. I’ll be 37 this year.

Is there anything hanging from your rear view mirror?

No.

What kind of milk do you drink?

Skim, which I rarely drink anymore, since I prefer water. I put milk on my cereal every morning, though. My current cereal obsession? Berry Burst Cheerios. Those are good, and I say that as someone who has never much liked Cheerios.

(Speaking of Cheerios, the silliest bit of product placement I have ever seen in a movie involved that cereal. In Superman, after Pa Kent’s funeral and Clark has found the green crystal, we cut to the kitchen table of the Kent farmhouse at sunrise, and Ma Kent’s arm swoops in and plunks a big old box of Cheerios on the table, right in the middle of the sunbeam that is streaming through the window. And if one sits through the film’s end credits all the way to the end, one will see the following: “Cheerios by General Mills”. That has always made me laugh.)

What is something you need to go shopping for?

Pie. That craving just isn’t going away, darn it all.

But this is the point in the week when we start putting together the weekly shopping list for my Saturday excursion to The Store. This week’s items include sandwich bags, a jug of spring water, milk, ice cream, some lunchmeat, bread, crackers, Colbyjack cheese, eggs, apples, bananas, a jar of garlic (I think), some pistachio nuts (how I love me some pistachio nuts!), and maybe some red wine. (There’s other stuff, but I can’t remember offhand, and the pad with the list is on the fridge door.)

On the “frivolous item” front, a couple of recent film music CD releases have tripped my “Gotta get that!” circuit breaker: the FilmScoreMonthly label has come up with an official re-issue of the wonderful music Elmer Bernstein wrote for the classically goofy animated flick Heavy Metal (Oh Taarna!), so now I can stop listening to the bootleg CD I have with its crappy sound quality, and Intrada has re-issued the campy, but fun, Stu Philips score to the 1979 movie Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. I know, I know, but I had the LP as a kid and played it to death, and there’s some powerful nostalgia at work for me with this one.

As usual, this quiz has no provisions for tagging people, so here it is if you want it.

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The Photobucket Quiz-thing

UPDATE 3-16-08: Some of the image sizes were screwing up the appearance of the blog, so I fixed the HTML to shrink ’em down a bit. Sorry things got ugly there for a few days.

Yes, it’s another quiz-thing! I’ve seen this in a bunch of places, most recently at Jason’s blog. Maybe I should rename this blog “Quiz things”. Anyway, this one looks fun, because it’s got the normal run of questions, but with a twist. The rules:

1. Go to photobucket.com
2. Type in your answer for each question into the PhotoBucket search bar.
3. Choose your favorite photo to represent your answer.
4. Copy the HTML and paste it here.
5. Answer only in picture form.

Got all that? Here we go!

1. What is your first name?

Kelly

(No idea whose picture this is supposed to be, but putting my first name returns a whole bunch of pretty women.)

2. When is your birthday?

september

3. What kind of car do you want?

landspeeder

4. Where did/do you go to school?

wartburg stadium

5. What is your favorite season?

Fall

6. What is your favorite type of shoe?

birkenstock

(Haven’t owned a pair in years, though.)

7. What is your status?

yawning

8. What is your favorite movie?

star wars

9. What is your favorite song?

On The Street Where You Live

(I can’t name a single favorite song, so here’s just one of my favorites, apparently used as the title for a mystery novel.)

10. Who is your favorite Disney character?

Kronk

11. What is your favorite clothing line?

dickies

12. What is your favorite vacation destination?

Bluff

13. What is your favorite dessert?

Ben And Jerry

or

Chocolate

or

Peach

or

Lemon cream pie

or

French carrot cake

or…I’ll stop there.

14. What is your favorite letter?

Q

15. What are you most afraid of?

loneliness

16. What is your favorite TV show?

Photobucket

17. What annoys you the most?

Republicans rock

and

clowns

and

For Better Or Worse Bedtime

and, of course, most of all:

Patriots

18. What is your job?

Maintenance

19. What’s your favorite animal?

cat

20. How old are you?

1971

(Couldn’t find any cool pics for ’36’, so I went with the year of my birth.)

No tagging, but this one was fun to do, so I recommend it.

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Loving the Library

I happened upon this library quiz-thing, and given my love of libraries and quiz-things, I just had to do it. Sadly, I had no idea that February was “Library Lovers Month” until three days into March, when I found this. Alas.

How do you plan on celebrating Library Lovers month?

Well, by doing this quiz, I suppose, since I missed the actual Library Lovers Month. Whoops!

How often do you accidentally spell library as ‘libary’ when you’re in a hurry?

Never, I think. Let me try: Library library library library library library lobrary librayr librayr library library library. Nope, just a couple of typoes, and neither was the one specified. When I make a typo, it’s almost always because in my haste I hit the keys in the wrong order, so there end up being the correct number of letters, but either an incorrect letter or two or all the correct letters in the incorrect sequence.

What is the largest amount of books you’ve ever had checked out at one time?

Probably around twenty or so, on a day when I’m grabbing a lot of stuff and The Wife grabs a lot of stuff and so does The Daughter. Usually it’s around ten items or so.

What is the longest you’ve ever gone without visiting the library?

Six months or so, from roughly July 2005 to the end of that year. It just got to the point where going out with Little Quinn for a jaunt to the library was too much work, and also, I had a fairly large fine to pay at that time, and I never had the cash for it. Which leads to the next question:

What is the biggest fine you’ve ever had?

I don’t remember the amount, but it was close to $30, after I forgot to return a couple of DVDs before we went on a trip across the country, which ended up being the last trip for 2005 until after Little Quinn died. The Buffalo and Erie County Public Library charges $2.00 a day for late DVDs, so by having two of them overdue by over a week, the fines racked up very quickly.

When you go to the library, do you plan ahead and make a list? Or do you browse?

Occasionally I’ll make a mental note of a title or two, but usually I just browse. I love to go online and request titles when I know there’s something specific I want; the great thing about having a large library system at my disposal is that I can request a book and have it delivered from another branch to my own local branch, where I then check it out. I always look at the New Nonfiction shelf first, and then wander the older nonfiction shelves. (I don’t much go into the fiction section unless I’m looking for something specific that I think I might want to read, since my personal book-buying is almost exclusively fiction.)

Have you ever been shushed by a librarian?

I’m sure I was in school a few times, but never at the public library, where the rule seems to be for people to use normal conversational voices.

What is the worst (against-the-rules) thing you’ve ever done in the library?

I’m assuming this doesn’t mean things like “Hey, baby, let’s go up to the third floor and join the Government Documents club!” (No, I’ve never done that.) Truthly speaking, I can’t think of anything I’ve ever done as a library patron that was against the rules. Now, as a library employee at the university where my father teaches, I must admit that there were times when being in the presence of all those books led to “reading on the clock”, but that’s most definitely the worst thing. Oh, and there was the time they had me doing some work in the A/V room all by myself, with the door shut. I found a set of tapes of historical speeches, and then I sat down and listened to several of them, all the way through. Man, that JFK delivered a heck of an Inaugural, eh? And Jimmy Carter’s acceptance speech in 1980? “Hubert Horatio Hornblower! Er, Humphrey!” Wow.

What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done to a library book?

Not returned one. When we moved from West Seneca, NY to Syracuse back in 2002, I thought I returned all the books to the West Seneca library. Not so much: I missed one, and didn’t discover it until we got unpacked in Syracuse. One of the first things I did when we moved back to Buffalo (Orchard Park, current location of Casa Jaquandor) was to return that book and settle up my fines for it.

Have you ever had a “favorite” librarian?

My mother. Duh. (Wow, that was too easy.) And there’s one at the current library who always comments when I have a piece of writing in the paper, which is cool.

If you could change one thing about your library it would be…

More books, obviously. More periodicals. The building itself could use some sprucing up. But by and large, my library is a terrific place. It’s next to an old train station that has been restored, and it’s across the street from my church. (If we’re talking about the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library as a whole, though, I’d increase its budget substantially, so long as there was money to do so.)

Let me close by once again voicing my general befuddlement at people who claim to love reading and yet don’t use their libraries. Limiting one’s reading to the books one can afford to buy makes absolutely no sense to me, and I say that as someone who already owns more books than I’m likely to be able to read in my lifetime and who has little intention of stopping. On the flip side, a Buffalo News columnist (Charity Vogel, I think) recently wrote an article about our libraries, citing a friend of hers who had moved to Hamburg, NY from Orlando, and had to start buying books because the Hamburg library doesn’t get the “newest, hottest reads” as quickly as the Orlando library had. This just struck me as terribly silly: judging one’s public library by one’s ability to walk in and check out the very latest by Nora Steele or Danielle Patterson or James Roberts or whomever is to miss the entire point of a public library by a huge margin.

And whenever I hear some libertarian or conservative type opine that maybe in the days of Amazon.com it’s time to let libraries slip into the past, I want to scream. I can’t think of a more misplaced set of priorities than that.

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Play that funky music, whiteboy!

I’ve seen this Stuff White People Like blog linked in a number of places, but Tosy and Cosh helpfully reduce it to a list, with commentary. Which means, you know, I’ll go all listy now as well. Basically I’ll do as he did and give a “yes” or “no” answer to each entry, with comment. I’m not so much doing this because I’m white (really, who cares) but because it’s a list. Note that this is not a “Bold the ones I like” list; I bolded them all to make the post easier to read.

(The original blog, by the way, has updated since I grabbed this from Tosy, so I’ll update this in a post down the line sometime.)

Anyway:

Graduate School

I never went, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not a fan. I figured that the world might not have needed another Ph.D in philosophy. Or something like that.

The Idea of Soccer

What is the “idea of soccer”? The notion of the world’s most popular spectator sport being a fairly boring game that has very little nuance? Bleeccchhh! You could pay me to watch soccer, since I’d do nearly anything for money, but I sure wouldn’t enjoy it. (Now, playing soccer is another story, since it’s a lot of running and kicking stuff. But things that are fun to do aren’t always fun to watch.)

Modern Furniture

Depends. Some modern-type furniture I find appealingly trippy, and a lot of actually is downright comfortable when you figure out how to sit in it. The library at my college (at the time – the library has since been rebuilt) had lots of sixties-era furniture, stuff that you might see lurking in the background of a scene of 2001: A Space Odyssey, and I loved sitting in those chairs, reading.

Multilingual Children

I can’t really say as I have a tremendously strong opinion here. If we’re going to decide that our children should be multilingual, obviously it’s best to do that early, but I don’t really know.

Musical Comedy

You’d better believe it! I love a good musical comedy. And even some not-so-good musical comedies.

Bottles of Water

I drink tons of water, so bottles are cool. We buy bottles by the case at The Store, and then after drinking the water that comes in them, we re-fill them and re-use them until they become too worn out to be useful, and then we break out a few new bottles from the case. Few things refresh like good old water.

Threatening to move to Canada

This is what pansy, pseudo-leftie nitwits do. Stay here and fight to make your country better, you bunch of doofuses! (Until the Bills move there, and then I’m outta here!)

Oscar Parties

Not really; I don’t take the Oscars that seriously anymore. But to attend one of the “official” parties, when you win one? Sure, I’d love to be at one of those.

When I eventually win the Oscar for Best Screenplay (note to self: start writing a screenplay), my speech will begin with this joke: “We writers aren’t Governors’ Ball types, so as the winning writer, it’s my responsibility to host the Writers’ Oscar Party. That’ll be at my hotel, Room 337 of the Hampton Inn by LAX. It’s BYOB, but we’re writers, so we’ve all got our own B.” You read it here first. [Cut to tight shot of Jack Nicholson, grinning tightly because he doesn’t get it or doesn’t care.]

Gentrification

You know, I hear this word a lot, and I still have no idea what it means. Something to do with city neighborhoods becoming lame, I think. I dunno.

Study Abroad

Never did it, myself. I suppose it makes sense for certain fields of study, like foreign languages or clandestine military activity.

Being the only white person around

I’m not sure exactly what’s so great about this. I generally don’t care who’s around me. Of course, this probably refers to traveling to entirely different cultures, which is a cool idea that I’ve never done before.

Difficult Breakups

They make for good fodder in romantic comedies and such, but to go through one? Who in their right mind would enjoy a difficult breakup? Especially since as you get older, your breakups can only increase in difficulty as they tend to involve kids and lawyers?

Mos Def

I don’t know who he is.

Michel Gondry

I don’t know who he is, either.

Standing Still at Concerts

Nah. I prefer to listen to my Berlioz and Rachmaninov sitting down. (I have never once attended a rock concert of any type. I’d love to hear some live Celtic music one of these years, but the proper setting for such is a pub, and those have seats.)

Divorce

See above on breakups. This is one road I have absolutely no desire to travel down, whatsoever, nosiree Bob. I know plenty of divorced people, and they’ve all (mostly) moved on to happiness in their post-divorce lives, but still, one of these friends described the experience to me in these words: “If you want to feel like throwing up for six months straight, get a divorce, ’cause that’s what it feels like.” I have no use for that.

Co-Ed Sports

Sure, what’s not to like?

Recycling

I do it, but I’m not sold on it as a major part of the solution to our environmental problems.

Expensive Sandwiches

Oh yes! I love a good sandwich, made with good ingredients. I’m not sure about the “expensive” part; I wouldn’t be terribly interested in spending $50 for a burger made of Kobe beef. But ten bucks for a sandwich on artisan bread? Sure.

Knowing what’s best for poor people

Well, depends, I suppose. I seriously dislike the condescension and judgmental nonsense thrown at the poor in this country, and the constant refrain that it’s their fault, the lazy freeloaders. And I seriously dislike the notion that because we aren’t in their position, we somehow know what’s best for them. Nothing illustrated this to me more than the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when Barbara Bush opined that the thousands of displaced persons living in the Astrodome in Houston had it pretty good.

All that said, however, there’s an extent to which any policy discussion over how to help the poor involves a discussion of what’s best for the poor. This kind of thing I find helpful.

Bicycles

Bikes rule. I need to get mine up and running this year.

Toyota Prius

I like the idea of the car, but I’m unlikely to be able to get one any time soon, so I’m personally ambivalent. What I really like is what the Prius represents: the notion that it’s our technological advancement that will be the largest factor in our solving our environmental problems. People who think that environmentalism translates to returning the world to some kind of medieval lifestyle annoy me.

Natural Medicine

There’s some good stuff there, but it does get difficult to separate out the complete nonsense from the stuff that actually works.

Japan

If only they’d ditch their creepy and disgusting addiction to whaling, Japan would be extremely cool. I would love to go to Japan someday.

Juno

Haven’t seen it yet, but soon will, and then I will report. I think that Diablo Cody is gorgeous, though.

Lawyers

Necessary and underappreciated, I suppose. The ones that I’ve met are usually decent people. But yeah, Shakespeare says to kill them all, so off they go!

Apologies

These seem terribly underrated. We really need to see a whole-hearted embrace in our society of the “Ahso Defense”.

Kitchen Gadgets

I love good quality cookware, but I find the vast majority of kitchen gadgets useless and stupid wastes of space. Why buy, for instance, a rice cooker when you can just learn to cook rice in a heavy saucepan that will have many other uses besides? Why buy an electric gizmo to grill a sandwich? All I need is some good pans, some good knives, and a few other items and I’m good.

Dogs

Meh. I’m a cat person. A dog can be OK if I get to know it. But it’s gotta be a dog. A Pomeranian is not a dog. It’s a yipping creature of ill breeding.

Sarah Silverman

I don’t know the first thing about her.

Living by the water

I’d love to live by water one day: a lake, a river, even a stream. Water is mythic. As it is, I live a few miles from one of the Great Lakes, which is good enough for now.

Irony

A powerful tool when used as that: a tool. I got very tired of the whole “Irony as overriding tone” thing that dominated everything in the 1990s.

Vintage

As you might expect, I own several pairs of vintage overalls, and I like to troll eBay for more, although the prices are often a bit out of reach for me. (A good pair of overalls will last forever if you use them for casual wear, as I do. No long days out in the fields for me!) It’s fun to look at brands that no longer exist with names like “PayDay”. I don’t have much interest for anything else vintage, though.

Whole Foods and grocery co-ops

Well, this is awkward. Given my occupation, Whole Foods is the enemy and must be destroyed. But that’s just a philosophical position, as Whole Foods does not exist in Buffalo, and I’ve heard no plans to attract them here. The big Buffalo co-op is the Lexington Co-op which I believe is in the Elmwood area somewhere. That’s a bit out of the way for me, so I’ve never been there. I do like the concept of local ownership of such businesses, and I’d probably shop at one at least occasionally if one was a bit closer to Casa Jaquandor. Price isn’t the biggest determining factor for me as to where I shop, as a rule, although it’s definitely a factor.

You know what I really love, though? Public markets like the famous one in Seattle and the St. Lawrence Market in Toronto. Places like that are just wonderful.

Arts Degrees

I’ve got one: a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy with a minor in music.

The Sunday New York Times

I used to be a big fan, but nowadays I generally don’t have time.

Asian Fusion Food

I don’t know anything about it, but when I hear the term, I think of those stereotypical pretentious restaurants where an entree consists of a plate with three bite-size morsels of something upon it. Not a fan of that kind of thing: when I order food, I want a plate full of food. And my favorite Asian food is the stuff that you’ll find in Chinatowns like Torontos, something that an Asian person might actually eat as a part of their daily life.

Public Radio

Longtime readers will know that I am a huge fan of public radio. You just have to find your right show. I love Prairie Home Companion, Thistle and Shamrock, Marian McPartland’s Piano Jazz, Car Talk, and others. (I’m not a big fan of This American Life, however; something about Ira Glass’s voice makes me want to lapse into a deep coma.)

Plays

Yup! Especially the flea-flicker and the Old Statue of Liberty. Those are great plays!

Oh, that’s not what this means. I’ve enjoyed live theater when I’ve gone, and yet, I haven’t gone in many years, which seems a pity given Buffalo’s unusually vibrant theater scene (for a city this size facing the economic challenges it does).

Sushi

Yes! I love it. I’ve never had the “raw fish” stuff, but I find a nice meal of sushi pleasantly nourishing.

Indie Music

If it’s good music, great. If not, forget it. Being “Indie” is no guarantee against sucking.

Apple Products

I like apple butter, apple-pie flavor ice cream, and I miss apple-flavored Slice pop.

The Steve Jobs cult creeps me out, though. I’m not in love with the whole “design is everything” ethos, nor do I buy the notion that Apple stuff is that much more robust than anything else. I find the idea of watching movies on an iPhone or an iPod terribly silly; I loved the bit at the Oscars the other week when Jon Stewart was watching Lawrence of Arabia on an iPhone and says, “Wow, the cinematography of this movie is amazing! I should watch in in widescreen! [turns phone sideways] Ohhh! Those are camels!”

And the whole “iBricking” thing really turns me off.

Netflix

Neat idea. We were in Blockbuster’s knockoff program for a while, but we don’t watch movies frequently enough to make it really worth our while, especially with the public library’s movie collection constantly improving, and the access to that collection is free, which stomps all over Blockbuster and Netflix.

Arrested Development

Never watched it.

Renovations

Well, of what? Taking an old building and making it better, whether for a home or a business? Sure, that’s great. In fact, I wish more old buildings would get renovated than either torn down for new buildings or, worse, allowed to rot while new buildings are built across the street. But not everything needs to be renovated, of course. And renovations poorly done can be disastrous.

Breakfast places

You’d better believe it. My favorite breakfast places are always the ones that are owned and run by locals in any given town, such as the wonderful Charlie’s Diner in East Aurora, NY (I can’t recommend this place highly enough, and if you go in late spring, be sure to sit on the porch and eat). And we’re rapidly coming up on one of New York State’s best traditions, Maple Weekend. We’ll be going to Moore’s Sugar Shack, which is a fabulous little place in the hills south of Arcade, for all the pancakes with fresh maple syrup we can eat. Oh Mama!

The Daily Show / The Colbert Report

I don’t get to watch them very often, because they’re on very late where we live (but they’re nicely broadcast on a Canadian channel out of Hamilton, ON). I love Jon Stewart. I’ve never seen Colbert’s show, unfortunately, but I did love his speech at the Correspondents’ Dinner from a couple of years back, so assuming that’s what his show is like, I’d probably love it.

Architecture

Well, I don’t know much about it, to be honest. But Buffalo’s architecture is wonderful, so I love it on that basis.

Marijuana

I’ve never tried it, so I don’t know. I think it should be legal, though.

Vegan/Vegetarianism

Nope. I eat meat. Nothing ever eats that something else doesn’t die, and anyway, if God didn’t want us eating animals, he wouldn’t have made them out of meat! (I do think that we eat too much meat in this country, but that’s not the same thing as saying nobody should eat meat.)

Snowboarding

I’ve never done it, but it does look like fun.

Wrigley Field

I’m not a Cubs fan. Wrigley looks like a neat place on teevee, and I’m sure it’s a great place to take in a game. But to have to do so watching the Cubs seems like too high a price to pay, especially with Harry Caray dead.

80s Night

Where? At a bar? A dance club? A roller rink? I love the cheesy 80s pop music, myself, so I’d probably enjoy the occasional 80s night.

Not having a teevee

Nah. I watch significantly less teevee now than I ever have before, but still, we have to be able to watch movies and stuff as a family. It’s not like we can crowd around the computer or the laptop.

Marathons

Gahhh! I hate running. Never liked running and never will. For cardio, at the Y, I use the stationary recumbent bikes, and I love biking in general. But running? Ugh. I don’t like running 26 feet, so why would I want to run 26 miles?!

Manhattan (and now Brooklyn too!)

I haven’t been to New York City since I was twelve or thirteen. I really want to go back someday; we’d love to be on the street during the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, and the Hayden Planetarium seems right up my alley, as does that bookstore that apparently has eighteen miles of books. But that’s all provisional, so I can’t say that I love Manhattan.

David Sedaris

Meh. I read through a collection of his essays once and while I didn’t hate him, I didn’t grok him either. I don’t understand the fuss over the guy.

Wine

I love wine, and I don’t drink enough of it. Port, sherry, Asti, Cava, Sauternes, Canadian ice wine, rieslings from New York, Valpolicella with pasta. Wine is wonderful and fascinating. (I’m a pretty non-sophisticated wine drinker, picking my bottles on the basis of price and on that of how pretty the label is. I also try to buy New York wines when I’m in the mood.)

Microbreweries

If the beer they make tastes good, then sure. If not, then no. I’m not of the view that microbreweries are inherently better than larger operations, but they have over the last couple of decades led to a more vibrant beer market, so that’s a good thing.

Having Two Last Names

With all due respect, who cares?! This is just silly.

Writers’ Workshops

I have no desire at all to attend one of these.

Being an expert on YOUR culture

I’m not, unless we restrict the concept of “MY culture” to those topics I write about on this blog, and even then I wouldn’t consider myself an expert on many of those topics, since blogging is in large part opining about that on which we know little.

Traveling

In the sense of “going other places”, absolutely. In the sense of the actual physical act of traveling, then maybe; it depends on the mode of travel. I don’t like flying; I find it unpleasant to begin with, and our air travel industry has made it a genuine pain in the arse. My favorite mode of travel is to pack some clothes and stuff, get in the car, and drive with one and only one rule: no Interstate highways. There’s magic to be found in this country that way.

Awareness

Too often “awareness” can seem an end in itself, but the way I figure it, if you can get one hundred people aware of something they might not have otherwise been aware at all, then maybe a few of them, or even just one, will go beyond awareness to activism, and that’s where change can happen.

Hating their Parents

Let me get this straight: we’re supposed to like divorce, messy breakups to our non-marriage relationships, and harboring negative feelings toward our parents? Wow, we’re quite the prize, aren’t we? I can’t believe we’re still single; who wouldn’t want to be around all this emotional angst and dysfunction?

Gifted Children

But it’s all good, because we like our children, as long as they read at a sixth-grade level when they’re in kindergarten or can speak two languages when they’re four.

Yoga

I’ve never tried it, but it can’t hurt, I suppose.

Having black friends

Why? So I can say “Some of my best friends are black!”? I like having friends.

Tea

Yup, I love tea. I recently acquired a nifty little device for brewing single servings of tea which I’ll post about some time. I don’t drink enough tea, actually; it’s really wonderful stuff. I love green tea and mint tea.

Non-profit organizations

This is too broad a category of things to like. The Discovery Institute is a NPO, and I find their existence embarrassing and annoying.

Asian Girls

“Girls”? Can’t we call them what we call them in this country: women? But yeah, Asian women tend to be really beautiful.

Wes Anderson movies

I’ve never seen one.

Making you feel bad about not going outside

What’s wrong with inside? Nothing. Outside’s cool, but does it need to be the subject of guilt? Not that I can see.

Barack Obama

If he wins the nomination, then you’d better believe it. If not, then thanks for playing and we’ll see you in 2012 or (to be hoped) 2016. In truth, I think that either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama would be infinitely preferable to John “The only solution to the colossal mess we’re in is to ratchet up George Bush’s awful policies to 11!” McCain.

Diversity

Again, it depends, doesn’t it? But on balance, I think that diversity tends to be a better thing than the lack of it.

Organic Food

I don’t know, really. I do know that organic stuff tends to cost more, so I avoid it pretty much on that basis alone.

Farmers’ Markets

Ach, I love farmers’ markets. The freshness you get is amazing. Here’s an example of a place where I find it worthwhile to spend a little more than usual on food. Corn on the cob from a farmers’ market, at the height of summer? Or blueberries picked that morning from a group of bushes less than ten miles from where you’re forking over your cash? Wonderful.

Assists

Ummm…not knowing much about basketball or hockey, I can’t say. But I do like the sentiment expressed by Crash Davis in Bull Durham on strikeouts versus groundballs: “Groundballs are democratic. Strikeouts are fascist.”

Film Festivals

I’ve never been to one.

Religions their parents don’t belong to

Does this mean my admiring Buddhism or Taoism is because my parents are neither Buddhists or Taoists? That seems a bit silly. Or is it, say, if I were to become an Anglican if my parents were Catholics (just to make up an example)? I don’t know, that seems silly to me.

Coffee

Otherwise known as “the magical elixir without which I become a complete jerk”. I love coffee. I adore coffee. I roll on the floor with coffee and massage its…oh yeah, sorry. (This year I’m trying to wean myself off sweetening my coffee. I’ve already cut in half the amount of sugar I put in it. I love sweet coffee, but I suspect that I don’t need that much sugar with my daily caffeine fix.)

And there we have it. I don’t like a lot of the stuff our “prototypical white guy” likes, and some of it, I really dislike. Am I still white?

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And the Lord did grin….

SamuraiFrog did this quiz a day or two ago, and though it doesn’t feature tagging, I’m grabbing it anyway, because it’s actually interesting and it’s a quiz. It’s about the Bible.

1. What translation of the Bible do you like best?

I’m always a bit amazed at the sheer number of Bible translations that exist, and the many ways in which the translations selected greatly impact people’s personal versions of Christianity. I can’t honestly claim to have a “preferred” translation, since I am only familiar with two – the two I own copies of, as luck would have it. Everyone agrees that for sheer poetry and beauty of language, the King James Version can’t be beat. My study Bible is the “Today’s New International Version”. I don’t really have an opinion on how it stands up as a translation or as a doctrinal document, and it seems pretty readable to me, so I’m fine with it. I bought this particular version more because of the additional materials it came with (maps, illustrations, commentary, and a nice concordance) than out of any allegiance to the translation.

But come to that, when I was shopping for a study Bible, I was struck by the sheer number of Bibles that are out there, the price that some of them command, and the fact that Bible publishers seem to want Bible-shopping to be difficult because more often than not the bloody book is shrink wrapped. There were several study Bibles that I wanted to thumb through to compare with the one I bought, but as those were shrink-wrapped and this one wasn’t, I made my choice accordingly.

Also come to think of it, here’s an interesting rant I found the other day on the topic of that incredibly thin paper Bibles are often printed upon. While I can see the point, I’ve never personally been bothered by bleed-through like this; in fact, I wish someone would print a Complete Works of Shakespeare on paper like this, so I could carry one around with me. None of my current three Complete Shakespeares are the kinds of books one wants to keep in one’s bookbag at all times.

2. Old or New Testament?

As far as what? The OT is always fascinating, of course, and it contains a great deal of stunning poetic language, especially in the Psalms and Ecclesiastes. But it’s also got all the blood-soaked material, which is fascinating in itself but not terribly inspiring in terms of morality, and it’s got all that incredibly creepy Law stuff in Leviticus. Frankly, the God of the OT is a very hard to swallow deity. The NT has the four Gospels, which of course contain the story of Jesus, which is surely one of the most compelling of all stories, whether you believe or not. Revelation is, of course, a pretty wildly trippy book. I haven’t made up my mind on Paul’s letters. Paul seems to vacillate wildly between sage wisdom and assertions that sometimes actually irritate me.

3. Favorite Book of the Bible?

The Song of Songs, which doesn’t seem to come up all that often in church. I wonder why.

4. Favorite Chapter?

Luke, chapter 2. It’s the most poetic of the Bible’s versions of the Nativity tale. This chapter is where the KJV stands above every other translation, in my opinion.

5. Favorite Verse?

There are a lot of verses I’ve come to love a lot since I’ve become exposed to the Bible, but for reasons of writerly admiration I have to cite the final sentence of the Gospel According to John (John 21:25):

And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain all the books that should be written. Amen. (KJV)

Or:

Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written. (TNIV)

That’s a really good ending sentence, I think.

6. Bible character you think you’re most like?

Wow, I have no idea. I guess I’ll take the easy way and name Thomas, since I doubt stuff. A lot.

7. One thing from the Bible that confuses you?

Just one thing? I don’t believe a more confusing book than the Bible exists. When I read the Exodus story a few years ago, this passage from Ex. 4:21 hit me between the eyes:

And the Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. (TNIV)

Emphasis added. That little bit, right there, seems to imply that Pharaoh’s not the villain of the Exodus tale he’s always made out to be, doesn’t it? It almost implies that if the Lord doesn’t “harden his heart”, the conversation between Moses and Pharaoh would run something thusly:

And Moses said, “Let my people go.” And Pharaoh, thinking at length, replied “Go, please. Here’s a map, and make sure you pack enough sandwiches for everyone.”

OK, that’s a bit flip, but the ensuing chapters, in which Moses is able through the Lord’s power to visit upon Egypt all those plagues, repeat the stuff about the Lord hardening Pharaoh’s heart, so Pharaoh is reduced to being a mere pawn in some game of God’s, as opposed to being what he’s usually depicted as: a guy who clings to his old Gods to his detriment. Given that this hardening of hearts leads right to God slaying all the firstborn, what does that say about God’s nature? And come to that, if God is a loving God when Jesus comes along, why did God change?

While I’m at it, the tale of Sodom and Gomorrah bothers me. Two angels come to live with Lot, and when a bunch of men come to his house and demand that he send the angels outside so they can have carnal relations with them, Lot’s response is, in my eyes, pretty staggering. He basically says: “I’m not sending these men outside to have sex with you! Here, rape my two virgin daughters instead!” (This is in Genesis 19.)

8. Moses or Paul?

Moses, I guess. His story is a pretty amazing epic, all things considered.

(And here’s my excuse to use this pic, snagged from John Scalzi from a while back:

That totally cracked me up, first time I saw it.)

9. A teaching from the Bible that you struggle with or don’t get?

John 14:6.

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

I’d honestly hate to think that good people who aren’t Christians in life will be turned away by God for this reason. I have a very hard time with this notion.

10. Coolest name in the Bible?

Is there any doubt? Nebuchadnezzar, of course!

11. What are you wearing right now?

OK, that’s not really on the original version of the quiz. It just seems like that question has to come up on every quiz, no matter what the topic.

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