How are you ringing in the New Year tonight?
Probably watching tv or reading till I fall asleep. We've rarely done anything to celebrate the New Year. When I was a kid, it was exciting to be allowed to stay up till midnight - my parents were very strict about bedtime even in my teen years. The best New Year's Eve I ever had was in college, my last year (I think) - all my friends spent the evening at Kevin Barry's pub in Savannah singing along to Irish music and (at least in my case) getting really drunk. We (my best friend/roommate and I) had a motel room, so we only had to walk there afterward, and I had the worst hangover of my life the next morning, but the fun of the night, the shared excitement, the closeness of friends, and kissing the really cute singer of the band, that's a really special memory. Since then, nothing has come close. How about you, what was your best New Year's Eve?
What's the best present you gave this year?
I don't know. I think the one I enjoyed giving most was my father-in-law's annual cheese basket. He and I have in common that we eat sharp, sour, and strong-tasting food, like pickles, olives, bleu cheese, and anchovies. Okay, I don't eat anchovies by the handful, but I will eat them, unlike anyone else in the family. I went to Earth Fare this year and chose a nice selection of cheeses - two goat cheeses, a Stilton, a Wensleydale, a cheddar. And I added in a container of cornichons. The ones Earth Fare sells are imported from France, ridiculously expensive, especially considering the cheap packaging, but just. incredibly. good. And I threw in some homemade bread, and that was nice to be able to do.
What is your pet peeve, the one thing which really drives you mad?
Submitted by Beki.
1) Laugh tracks. I can't watch sitcoms anymore at all unless they're laugh track-free. Like The Office & Arrested Development.
2) Conservative talk radio. Is it a pet peeve or an actual hatred.
3) Heavily scented people/things. Especially people in enclosed spaces.
4) People who talk on their cell phones in a very non-private way. Like loudly, or with a companion who is staring off into space, ignored for a long time. At almost every restaurant and coffee shop I enter, I see a note at the counter asking people not to order while talking on their cellphones. And really, it embarrasses me for my species that people have to be told this.
What are the things in life that you're truly passionate about?
Submitted by Jess.
The question reminds me of Bertrand Russell's essay - probably the most beautiful five-paragraph essay ever written - Three Passions I Have Lived For. Here's the first paragraph:
Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a great ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.
I can't equal his prose or the depth of his sentiment, but he makes me think about what are the guiding passions of my life. Love, certainly, is one. Not longing because I've been so blessed with it from birth - both loving and being loved. But appreciating and clinging to love in all its forms, that would be a passion. And learning - lifelong learning - is a great passion for me. My learning needs relate to other people - culture and language mainly - but also to myself, and I think my desire to understand myself and develop myself has motivated a lot of my interest in others. And teaching is a passion, not only as a profession but as a particular kind of relationship I relish having with people. Teacher and student, whether formal or not, I love both roles.
What books did you love as a child?
Submitted by hearts.
Oh my goodness. Where to begin? The books I loved then I pretty much still love now. Here's a sampling from as early as I can remember reading on my own, of the books I read over and over and over.
The Great Brain books - who wrote those?
Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little by E.B. White
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
Dr. Doolittle - who wrote that?
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
Ramona et al. by Beverly Cleary
Lad, A Dog - and all the other dog books by Albert Payson Terhune
Mustand, Wild Spirit of the Rest et al. by Marguerite Henry
The Black Stallion et al. by Walter Farley
Anne of Green Gables series by Lucy Maud Montgomery - if I had to pick a favorite, it would be these
Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte - she pretty much got me through my teen years
I Am The Cheese et al. - Robert Cormier
The Lord of the Rings
What's one thing you regret not doing?
Submitted by Mr. Nice.
I regret not living abroad when I had the chance. It's only a little regret because I have none for what I did instead - go to grad school in Oregon, meet and marry my husband, here, and all that followed. But still, if I could have inserted an extra ten years - without aging - between undergraduate and grad school, I would have spent it teaching English in Japan and other places. Right after college, I longed to go to Japan.
What's your favorite heartbreak song?
Submitted by esta86.
Bonnie Raitt, "I Can't Make You Love Me." Even Patsy Cline didn't get sadder than that.
I was at a meeting the other day and met several new people, among them a man around my age or a little younger who is in a similar field. My interaction with him was maybe slightly more friendly just because we had more overlap. And he was personable. I liked him on sight. But I felt some unexpected level of interest in the way he looked at me and talked to me. I felt this, but maybe I was totally imagining it. But I don't normally imagine that kind of thing; in fact, I normally imagine exactly the opposite. It was flattering, but disconcerting. I'm likely to see this person again, and I'll be on edge. No reason not to be friendly besides my intuition, which may be way off base. Whatever I felt may be something in him, some reaching out for something, but nothing to do with me.
Buffy: ". . . if I don't pass Mrs. So-and-so's chemistry test."
Willow: "Chemistry test? I can help you with that. Chemistry is easy - it's a lot like witchcraft, but less newt."
What's the worst pickup line you've ever heard?
Submitted by ShellEy.
One time, somebody in a bar really said to me, slurring drunkenly, "Are you married? It's too bad you're married. Cause I'd like to jump yer bones."
And since I'm a sucker for romance, needless to say we had a one-night-stand after that.
(That's a joke, of course. I've never had a one-night-stand.)
