Eight More Things

Virushead tagged me for an 8 Random Things about me meme. I like Heidi quite a bit, so I'll play along.

Here are the rules.

1. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged need to write a post on their own blog (about their eight things) and post these rules.
3. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight ( or whatever number) people to get tagged and list their names.
4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

OK, on to the eight random things about the Contemplator!

1. I am secretly afraid that I will swallow a battery. When I was a little girl, I heard that batteries would let off a charge if you put them to your tongue. Now, I won't get close to a battery, for fear it will somehow end up shocking me, I'll swallow it in a jolt of fear, and it will dissolve in my stomach acid and kill me. Bet you didn't want to know that.
2. My family is well documented for over 400 years worth of fighting and throwing metaphorical bricks. The very first recorded instance of us ever in history is when we declared war on our next door neighbors in southern England in the 1600s because we thought they were shoving their religion down our throats. I shit you not--I've seen the paperwork. There are more recorded instances of this particular strain of family purposely standing in the line of fire on principle (usually a stupid principle) than there are natural recorded deaths. In one instance, the entire neighborhood turned out to intimidate my great-great grandfather. When threatened with a shitload of guns if he chose to unlock the school room (another story in itself), he reportedly turned around, gave them the "look" (ask me, I'll show you), and turned the key anyway. He fell dead with over 30 bullet holes. But by god, he did what he wanted. Eyeroll. So you see, I can't help it. Causes nobody dares to take up? I'm there. It's in my blood. Our root name in the Old English means "to contend with." Seriously, people, I'm not making this up.
   
3. I have the alcoholic tolerance of someone twice my size. It's been tested. I don't look like I could drink like I can, but I can handle myself quite well--until the shots come out. I'm vulnerable to shots. Especially butterscotch schnapps shots, which taste nothing like actual butterscotch, which I hate with a passion.
   
4. I've been asked to model approximately twice per year since I was 17 years old. It's because I'm about Kate Moss's size and height, and I have a good face for makeup, but I've always been rather suspicious about it. But approximately two times a year, somebody gives me a card or somebody who has been in the business asks me if I've considered it. It's a mark of how hard my Jehovah's Witness mother tried to quash any feelings of beauty I could have about myself that when I get these offers the cynic in me says "internet porn scam!!" and not "huh. I must be pretty." Which I rarely ever think about, except for two times: once when I saw myself in stage makeup when I was an undergraduate in a play (I was far and away better looking than the other people--which could just mean they were quite ugly :D-- and my stage director asked my mother "Have you considered putting her into modeling?") and the other day when I saw my old passport of me at 23 years old. I'm not saying I have bad self-esteem, because I really don't--I was just rigorously taught to avoid any thought about looks.
   
5. I am on the short list to the JW shit list. It's bad enough for them that I'm their equivalent of excommunicated; but the interference I've done recently has me on a watch list. The next step for me is "apostasy", and the only way to really define that is to say that you're one of Satan's confirmed imps (like there was ever any doubt??). Mainline to hell, baby, except they don't believe in hell--so mainline to certain destruction with no hope of recovering your hard drive. Whatever. I've seen student portfolios that were scarier than that possibility. But even just five or ten years ago, that would've really bothered me. Now, I could care less. In fact, I would welcome the opportunity. See #2 above.
6. If I could command my future, apart from the scantily clad men who would feed me cheese and pour my wine all day every day, I would be the director of a nonprofit. I love this work more than any other work I've ever done. I feel like I'm moving a problem with my own two hands. I get so much personal return from this job, that I don't even know how to adequately describe it. I'm so happy in my low paid assistant director job that I'm in no hurry to leave it. In fact, I didn't realize that I was actually making more money than I thought I was working for within the first few weeks of the job, that's how much I liked it--the pay didn't matter. Somehow, I've got to work it to where this is all I do. 'Cause I love it, baby.
7. And now, for the controversial bit. I wish more people lived in free love commune style relationships. Yes, I realize that's inherently complicated because people are immature twits, but I think most people fall somewhere along the middle of the monogamy--play the field spectrum. Frankly, I think some people would do well to have a wife and a mistress, or a husband and a boyfriend. As long as the limits are understood by everybody involved, of course, which is where such things fall apart. My girl Bitch PhD. manages to do it--a husband and at last count two boyfriends. And now for the disclaimer: I'm not complaining, and, yes, everything is fine at home. :)
8. My other secret wish is to start traveling and never stop. I want to go from one country to another for varying periods of time, but I want to be "away" for far more games than I'm "home." On my hit list in the next few years are Ireland, the UK, Mexico a few more times, Jamaica, and Italy. I've got *way* more than that, and I should've gone to the damned Middle East before my cousin moved back to Hickstown, Nowhere, but live and learn the hard way. When I get super fancy with my wishes, I start figuring how much it would cost to have a place in Mexico (surprisingly very, very little). I want to go to South Africa for the World Cup. I might convince Batmite! to show me India, but his culture might get in the way--maybe I could pretend to be his American fiance? C'mon, just for a few weeks? I'm dying to go to Japan. I really want to go see Morocco. Pretty much just...everywhere, really. Where there's a will, there's a way. Oh, and did I mention I'll be in Acapulco, Mexico in less than a week? Whee!
   

You can do this meme if you want to, but I'm particularly interested in three people:

1) JP, a never ending fountain of interestingness--what are your dark secrets, slave boy?

2) Batmite!, who, although his home base is a gazillion miles further away than JP's, is not the one I dream I'm looking for while I'm driving around in the car in a city at night. He's in the passenger's seat. Neither the lost one nor the passenger boy will help me interpret just what the fuck this means.

3) El Hijo de Verde--although it absolutely must be wrestling related. Maybe 8 unconventional wrestling facts? 8 secrets you horde about wrestling?

-- Virgil, who has said far too much already...