25 things

Rules: Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose people to be tagged. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.

I am tagging spazz.me, prettymike, Pop and Ice, Ponti Mython and fashion chalet

I'm not moved much by art. I don't understand poetry 98% of the time. I am, however, a fan of talent. I have a thing for statues. I'm amazed by anyone that can look at a block of marble and *see* something in it enough to create it. I think I could live to be 1,000 years old and still not develop that kind of vision.

That said, I am a Jack Vettriano fan. He's the only painter to date that I get. The image on the page is one of his. Someone told me a few years ago that it reminded them of me. Like all the compliments in my life - that can be taken in a good way or a bad way. I have two Vettriano prints in my house. One is 'Dance me to the end of love' and it hangs in my dining room.

Really, how can I not like someone who paints like that and says things like, "Creative people are stifled somehow by domesticity. They need to have late nights and bad mornings" which I completely agree with - and “...she looked like a woman to whom a pledge of eternal love might provoke her to stab you with a stiletto.” - I think I love him.

If you can make me laugh, you're golden. I'm a rather serious sort and I see reality in cold, harsh hues and that's what makes me point out the humor of life. I don't tell jokes. I don't find slapstick amusing in the least, but if you can make me laugh about the realities of life - you're in. I'm completely amused by irony.

Classic example: I don't gamble. I've been to Atlantic City in Jersey and Turning stone in New York and it's a waste of time for someone like me. I'll look at a table and all I can see is...that person is waging a mortgage payment, a gas & electric bill and a week of groceries.

So, OF COURSE, I'm dating a poker player who loves Vegas.
That's funny!

Another example: Around Christmas I was at the convenient store with my son. That boy has zero luck and has to learn everything the hard way. The last thing he should ever do is gamble. I have no idea what made me do it, but I told him to go get a scratch off ticket. The ironic part is when someone hands me a ticket like that, it's usually a winner if it's not my idea...and it's rarely my idea. I threw the ticket in my purse and we scratched it off when we got to my driveway.

We won a dollar.
The ticket cost a dollar.
Stupid.

Then the jokes started flying. If we had won $700 - what would have happened is the car would have suddenly lost its transmission turning it in and it would have cost exactly $700 to fix it. Ah, the irony of life. It's funny to me.

I worship ambition. There is something so appealing about the spark that someone gets when they know they're on their way to something big. Give me a 'something from nothing' story any day. Some, "I don't care what the odds are - even against ALL odds - and I'm going to make it anyway" and you've got a captive audience in me. It's one of the things I love about Grant. He decided at 14 he wanted to be in finances. He's done that for the last 20 years now. I love that. A decision was made and nothing led him astray.

I would rather bleed half to death in front of you versus cry in front of you. Unless it's over a movie. That I see as acceptable. If we watch 'Rudy' together or the movie about the American hockey team winning against the Russians in the 80s - forget it. Double issue, nothing to something scrapper group with patriotism thrown in. I'm done.

I've lived in pain every day for the last six years. Some days it's just an annoyance. Other days I want to rip the disks in my spine out myself with a knitting needle. The cold of New York is pissing me right off.

A tip: If you're around me and I ever say something casually like, "I think I need to go to the hospital" - get the car because three seconds later, I'll change my mind and try to talk you out of it - and the odds are great that I WILL be able to talk you out of it. For me to even utter those words though, it's serious. No matter how calmly or quietly I say it. A lesson Grant has already learned.

The only thing that gets me up some days is pure anger over it all. A lot of people say that anger is a bad thing. I disagree. If you use it the right way, it's quite motivating. Being driven by rage has accomplished a lot of things in my life.

There are God's laws, Man's laws and My laws. I have maybe two morals; one I jumped up and down on this past year. Not good. Never again.

When it comes to God's laws, what I hold fast to is - never lie to a Priest. Clearly, I will have a full on argument with a Priest - which is why I wasn't allowed to get married in a Church the first time around. Which is STILL better than lying to a Priest to get the job done in my book.

As for Man's laws, I'm hoping to get through life without having to unjustifiably commit a felony. So far, so good. As for My laws, I'd rather slit my own wrists than break one of my own laws.

Ethics I have in abundance.
I'm unclear as to whether ethics and morals are interchangeable.
I'm still working that one out.
To date, I'm unconvinced.

I'm not much one for social pressures. I never fell for peer pressure in school. I don't fall for it now. If I do something it's because I want to, not because I have to. There is such a thing as etiquette and good manners that rule my world, but I'm not about to do something that I'm really against just for the sake of the rest of the world or how it will appear.

Seriously, who cares.
No one should really care what I do anyway as long as it doesn't affect them.
I'm not here to hurt anyone.

I care very little about living my life how other people think I should. I'm a firm believer that the vast majority of things that we have to do in this life; we have to do alone. That includes being born and dying. There are things that no one can do for us. Worrying about how it's viewed by others is a giant waste of time. I don't crave being seen in a bad light, of course, but at the end of the day - I only have to answer to myself and if I'm okay with it; that's that.

Every now and then I'll hear how my life looks like chaos and it makes me smile. How, on paper, it may look like a mess. This always amuses me. The decisions I made at the exact moment I made them - I don't regret. It's what was necessary at the time. There's a reason for every single thing I do and nothing is done without thought.

I'm a detail person. I always look at the whole of the picture, not just the here and now. I know that the things I do today could effect what happens 20 years from now. It's that 20 year mark that I focus on.

I believe that time works for me. Anyone can go anywhere they want to; as long as they know where they're going to. This is also why temptation isn't a huge problem in my life. I always have my eye on the target and I protect it like it's a helpless child. I'm always in it for the long haul.

I judge EVERYTHING. I don't know who the hell came up with the idea that judging is a bad idea. I don't really care what anyone else does, per se, as long as they're not doing it to me and those I love. We're good. Have at it.

The key to judging though, is measuring someone by their *own* measuring stick - not by mine. Mine is only to judge myself. It's not for anyone else. You make your own proclamations about what you think is right or wrong and I'll take you for your word. I don't have to like it. I don't have to live by it. I don't care. I'm also not going to hold it against you either.

I'm not here to live anyone's life for them. I'm not here to change anyone. I'm not here to push my rules on you. You don't answer to me - and I don't expect you to. If you want to be a part of my day to day life, that's a different story. Even with that though, I'm not trying to change anyone, I'm just looking for a good working fit. Naturally; not forced.

I love my cousin Richard. We don't see each other too often. We don't need to; it diminishes nothing. I know that he's a phone call away if I need him. If he needed me, I'd move Heaven and Earth to help him. He's honest and caring and has this humble side to him. The humble side of a man that understands what's important in life and doesn't lose sight of it. I idolize him and I have zero issue admitting that. I've seen him in that light for the last 32 years and I don't anticipate that ever changing.

Note for Pop and Ice: Oh, and by the way, My Richard is a down to earth Taurus...

I'm not a designer clothes snob. I don't have a million shoes. I don't have more clothes than God, like my daughter. I don't get my hair done or my nails done - I do that myself. I will take quality over quantity though, thank you very much. I'll spend $150 on high-heeled leather boots and be content with just that and expect them to last.

I will also get equally mad about spending money on something that's suppose to be high quality that ends up being junk. That sets me off like no tomorrow. I'm still pissed off about a purchase I made 5 years ago. I understand the value of money.

I am, however, a hotel snob. I can base an entire vacation on never leaving a hotel room. The Waldorf is next - and I couldn't care less if I step one foot on the streets of NYC while I'm there. I don't care how much it costs either. I'm worth that.

PETA can kiss my ass. I have furs and if some jackass throws red paint on it, someone is getting hit in the face. Oh, yeah, and I'm going to eat the cow too.

I've been proposed to 49 times. This irritates Grant every time it gets mentioned, but it's a fact. Grant would make 50. A ridiculously large ring has to be involved though. If I have to look at something for the rest of my life, it better be stunning. He'll never have to buy another piece of jewelry for me after that as long as he lives. It's the one that counts. I have no idea why he gets that certain grin on his face when I say that, but he does and it's cute - and I know he knows exactly how serious I am when I say it.

I believe we're all here to learn something. I think that's our lot in life. What I'm here to learn might be different than what you're here to learn - that's why I think it's a huge mistake to try to push your beliefs on someone.

I'm more interested in the oceans than in space, even though Quantum Physics is fascinating. I believe that everything we need to cure whatever comes up can be found right here on Earth. I believe we have all the resources we need at our disposal, we just don't either know how to utilize them yet or haven't discovered them yet. I also believe a lot of the answers are in our oceans.

Grant has introduced me to a whole other world with how smart he is and how interested he is in space and time and thinking outside the box. I like the box! I'm comfortable in the box! He has no such limitations. There are times he goes off and I sit there with this smile plastered on my face and I know that there will be 48 things I'll need to look up afterward just to figure out what he just said to me. We attacked carbon dating before he left.

I may also have to take a chemistry course just to be able to talk to him.
Which is fine, I can do that.

I'm a control freak. Not so much because I want to be, but more because I have to be. Someone has to be in charge. My motto has always been, "I'll give up control when I find someone that can do an equal or better job than me - Good luck with that!" - I've discovered that if I put someone in charge of something and expect them to come through, they rarely let me down. This is entirely different than leaving my life and the decisions therein in someone elses hands.

Grant has proven that he can handle crisis and not fall apart. He just looks at me and goes, "I'll take care of it" - this use to make me leery and panic that I would still have to clean up the mess afterward. I feel less like that as time passes because he's handled everything he's said he would handle. This is priceless to me.

Like the time two months when the water ran cold in the shower and I told him that there was no way in hell that I was lighting a pilot light and what did he know about such things.

I refuse to stick my hand in the garbage disposal too.
I've seen the movie Poison Ivy!
Fuck off!
Not doing it!

This led to us going into the basement and finding it drowning in a foot of water..../twitch.

All I could do was stare at the ceiling and think, "OF COURSE MY BASEMENT IS UNDER WATER! HOW COULD IT NOT BE, IT'S BEEN QUIET FOR NEARLY 24 HOURS!"
- AND it was still raining.

PERFECT!
That's BEAUTIFUL!

We just got done dealing with having to have the entire first floor redone because of the carbon damage from when the fireplace started burning raw gas instead of whatever mixture it was suppose to. That took a month. The day before he cleared out the gutters in single digit temperature in the dead of night because it started leaking in the Florida room.

Really...
I start laughing because, again, life's irony...

What...
Is the plague coming next?

While I'm seeing swarms of locus in my head, he just simply looked at me and said, "I'll take care of it".

He didn't even go to sleep that night until it was taken care of for me.
Even bigger than that, I didn't doubt him.
That's HUGE to me.

I'm unconventional in my parenting. I'll give you all the cold, hard facts. I'll give you my opinion. I'll warn you of the consequences - and then I'll let you make your own mistakes and I'll let you pay for them too. If you screw up, it's not because you weren't well informed.

I'm not big on schedules.

I use to serve on the Law Enforcement Counsel. I was also instrumental in changing the by-laws in my state. Both were sort of accidental. I'm not in law enforcement, nor am I a politician. Just the right place at an odd time.

This year is the first year since I was 18 that I haven't owned my own business. My first business benefited a homeless shelter downtown. I got to meet the Attorney General's office first hand over that one. I was so point blank about what I was doing that they didn't have a clue what to do with me. I can still remember the look on the guy's face from that office when I asked him why I couldn't do exactly what I wanted to and how flustered he got because he didn't have an answer for me and no one had done what I was doing before. No answer? Then get out of my building and come back when you've got a real reason. Never saw him again and I wasn't doing a thing wrong; just no one had approached it the way I did before. That's not my problem. Next.

I have an intense interest in law. When I'm in court I run on such a high just being there that by the time I get home - I'm literally exhausted and crash hard. I would love to be an attorney one day. It's nothing short of manic.

I completed 6 of my 10 courses to become a paralegal. Who the hell wants to do all of that though and not be eligible to try a case? Tons of grunt work and in this state, you don't even need a paralegal certificate to be one. Waste of time and it doesn't even count towards becoming an attorney.

My grade point average when I'm at college has been a steady 4.0. And trust me, I'm every Professors dream and nightmare all rolled into one. I know I could do it. It just costs a small fortune. Between $250-400K. I still might though. It would not be unlike me to wake up one days and go, "Alright, this is what I'm going to do now" - and then just do it.

I have it in my head that I'm meant to own property. So, that's a given before I'm dead. What I'd like to do is be a Landlord. I've heard all the horror stories. One of my really good friends is a landlord as well as my sister. Ideally, what I'd like to do is rent to single mothers and be in a position to give them every December free of rent. I'm a firm believer that no good ever comes to anyone that doesn't give back and I know how hard it is for single mothers.

If you cheat on me - the possibility exists that I might burn your house down, ruin your credit, do some property damage to your car, you'll wish you were dead - and you might get your wish. I'm so over that shit it isn't even funny.

If you want to go, go, I won't stop you - there are 303 million other people in this country alone. Have a nice life, I'll wish you well, I'll even help you go and play fair every step of the way - leave with some integrity though. Because just like no good ever comes to those that don't give back - no good ever comes from unnecessarily fucking me over either. Pay now, pay later - but I assure you, you will pay. A good time is not had by all when someone winds up on a milk carton!

I've been called brutally honest dozens of times in the last year. I don't think it was meant as a compliment, but I can live with it.

This whole written page is a prime example about how seriously I take everything and how I horrify some people because I'll just say what's on my mind and not care how it's taken...(because really, what the hell do you care what I write anyway?)

If you're a true friend to me - you'll have a loyal friend for the rest of your life. I never forget a kindness either.