Friday's (late) Feast

Appetizer

What is the nearest big city to your home?

Chicago. Sprawling, wonderful, intricate, lovely Chicago.

Soup

On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how well do you keep secrets?

Pretty well. Of course, about 40% of the time I forget I even know the secrets I'm told. The fact is, people tell me secrets, and then it turns out the secrets aren't interesting at all, so I forget about them almost immediately.

I'm pretty good about keeping the juicy ones, though.

Salad

Describe your hair (color, texture, length).

It's brown, ramrod straight, falling past my shoulders. Nothing useful can be done with it. Whatever you try, it just straightens itself right out again. Color from the home coloring kits won't stay in it, neither will curls or clips. It's obnoxious.

Main Course

What kind of driver are you? Courteous? Aggressive? Slow?

I am the only person in the tri-state area who knows how to drive. I have a news flash for you bitches: at a four-way stop, the right of way goes like this:

1. People turning right.
2. People going straight.
3. People turning left.

So the next time I'm turning left and you just sit there staring at me, don't look all shocked when I cuss you out.

Other than four-way stops, I'm pretty laid back. I cuss at people a lot, but I'm not aggressive. I like to play cribbage on license plates. I let people in to "re-shuffle" my hand.


Dessert

When was the last time you had a really bad week?

Early April, whenever that trip to St. Louis was. That was pretty awful. But my noggin is finally all healed up!

Friday's Feast

Appetizer

What was your favorite cartoon when you were a child?
Oh, there were so many. I loved Scooby-Doo until an incident with my kindergarten teacher that was inexplicably embarassing. She pointed out that "Maggie" (the name I went by then) rhymed with "Shaggy," and giggled in such a way that made it clear that she was making fun of me. Bitch.

I liked Thundercats, Transformers, She-Ra, and Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman figured into my Plans for Being a Grown Up. (These plans, in my mind, deserved capital letters.) I was going to marry Maxwell Smart, and I knew this just as surely as I knew Monday followed Sunday. We were going to live in the city, and we would live next door to the A-Team, and Wonder Woman and I were going to Hang Out and be Best Friends and she was going to be nice to me. (This cofession, whispered at the tender age of six to my favorite great-uncle, was met with a grave and understanding nod and best wishes to my future marriage. This is why he was my favorite uncle - he never laughed at my dreams.)

Soup

Pretend you are about to get a new pet. Which animal would you pick, and what would you name it?

I nearly got two parakeets this week. They were offered - along with a cage, bowls, toys, and food - on Freecycle on Thursday. I sat at my desk and daydreamed about having two little parakeets, teaching them to say "I pity the fool" and "Psht bitch please." After a doctor staying in the hotel stopped by my desk to bitch about the price of the internet, I added "I gots to get paid, son!" to the list. I would name them Laurel and Hardy, and teach them to sing along when I played my uke. (There was a lot of time for daydreaming on Thursday.)

I looked up what it took to take care of them, and the grand plans for Laurel and Hardy flew the coop, if you'll pardon the expression.

I don't want another cat, they tear things up. I'd love a dog, but my place is too small. Fish are boring, I have a poor history with hamsters and gerbils, and I would never find anyone who would take care of a pet lizard if I went out of town.

So, I started small. My neighbor and I went to the Garfield Park Conservatory today; they were having a sale on herbs and flowers. I got a little geranium that smells like lemon. I named her Gladys and plan to get her a hanging pot tomorrow. If I can make this work, I might try fish next. Wish me luck.

Salad

On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how much do you enjoy getting all dressed up for a special occasion?

Ok, here's the thing about me dressing up. I am always the most inappropriately dressed person around. From weddings to court dates to just regular dates, I am always over dressed, under dressed, or just wrongly dressed. I can't get fashion; dumb-ass me always takes into consideration things like "Well there's no way I'm going to make it tonight in shoes like that," and the outfit sullenly follows.

I would love to get dressed up, but there's no place to go and I would do it wrong anyway, so rating this a 10 would be moot.


Main Course

What kind of music do you listen to while you drive?

Depends on my mood. I like loud music, though, so I don't zone out and forget to turn when I should.

Dessert

When was the last time you bought a clock? And in which room did you put it?

I don't remember exactly, but it was probably a CD player/radio/alarm clock and I put it in the bathroom. I like to listen to the radio when I'm taking a shower before bed, and in the morning when I'm getting ready. I don't have one in there now, though. Instead, I torment my neighbors with my atrocious singing at night and in the morning I listen to the news from the bedroom.

That came out wrong. Well, you know what I mean.

Friday's Feast

Appetizer
Name something you would categorize as weird.
My family.

Soup
What color was the last piece of food you ate?
Multicolored: Jack's thin crust with pepperoni and sausage.

Salad
On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how much do you enjoy being alone?

9.5

Main Course
Fill in the blank: I will _________ vote for ___________ in _______.

try to, the lesser of two evils, November.

Dessert
Describe your sleeping habits.
I like to sleep with my arm curled up under my pillow, which is why my shoulders are bothering me lately.

Friday's Feast

Appetizer

Name a color you find soothing.

When the sun has just dipped down over the horizon, leaving us to our own devices for the evening, and half the sky is a dark and mysterious blue and the other half is a lighter, more hopeful blue, there's a blue that binds them together. I guess it's closest Crayola name is Royal Blue. But it's more than just royal to me, more than the stuffy pomp and circumstance that that word intones. It's the color I think of when I hear "My Blue Heaven," the color I tried so hard to dye my hair when I was young and easy to please.

Royal, rambunctious, lovely blue. It's where my peace lives.

Soup

Using 20 or less words, describe your first driving experience.

Don't remember exactly, but I do remember my mom freaking out when I got the car up to 30 mph.

Salad

What material is your favorite item of clothing made out of?

Cotton. The commercials are cheesy but they don't lie.

Main Course

Who is a great singer or musician who, if they were to come to your town for a concert, you would spend the night outside waiting for tickets to see?

Paul Simon and Tom Waits.

Dessert

What is the most frequent letter of the alphabet in your whole name (first, middle, maiden, last, etc.)?

Erm, with my legal name it's A, but with any of my nicknames it's M.

Friday's (late) Feast

Appetizer
Invent a new flower; give it a name and describe it.

The Megret flower has a thick stem and slighly opaque, blue petals. It's shaped a little like a ukulele.

Soup
Name someone whom you think has a wonderful voice.

My friend Kristi has a great singing voice. My friend Heather has a great speaking voice, but both of these women already know that about themselves.

Salad
On a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being highest, how clean do you keep your car?

1 is the lowest I can go? Because I'm thinking -23.

Main Course
How do you feel about poetry?

Most of it is superfluous. I like Bukowski, though, and I'll never turn down a good limerick.

Dessert
What was the last person/place/thing you took a picture of?

There's a door to the stairwell of the parking garage at the hospital where I was on Saturday morning that had some, I don't know, graffitti (or maybe it's just peeling paint) that looked like Sloth from "The Goonies." I got home and uploaded the pictures I took, and now it looks to me more like if Sloth and Jabba the Hut had a baby.

Friday's Feast

(Play along here.)


Appetizer

Have you ever played a practical joke on anyone? If so, what did you do and who was your victim?

Nothing big, just little things. I'm not good at practical jokes. I'm not a very practical person.

Soup

What do your salt and pepper shakers look like?

They look like they're cheap. They were. I used the pepper one once as a juicer for a lemon. Remeber?

Salad

Where is the next place you plan to visit (on vacation or business)?

I'm going to see Rachel in Indianaplis on March first and I'm pretty excited about it!

Main Course

What kind of lotion or cream do you use to keep your hands from getting too dry?

I usually just get whatever's in the "samples" section of the Walgreen's. You know, those little lotion, um, bottles I guess that fit in your purse. I go in October or November and grab 5 or 10 of one kind so I have enough for the whole winter (including the ones I know I'm going to lose.) This year it was some lovely smelling thing, Curel I think. It's February so I've lost them all. I do have a tube of CVS brand hand lotion with aloe. That stuff works pretty well.

Dessert

Make up a dessert, tell us its ingredients, and give it a name.

Man, you know I can't cook! Umm...all I can think is Fondue. There is going to be some fondue madness on Sunday at Ed's Oscar "party," so I kind of have it on the brain.

Friday's Feast

(Play along here.)


Appetizer

Name one thing that is unique about you.

I have had 23 jobs.


Soup

Fill in the blank: My favorite _________ is __________ but I like _________ too.

painter, Enrique Tábara, Van Gogh


Salad

What type of wood do you have for your home’s furnishings?

Whatever I can get. I think I only paid for three pieces of furniture in my apartment (the bed, futon frame, and book shelf). The rest (coffee table, rocking chair, futon pad, buffet, dining table and chairs, computer desk,bedside tables, dresser, wooden table by the front windows, chairs by the front windows, cabinet in the bathroom, toy chest (now home to my blankets and sheets), were all either gifts or stuff I salvaged or got from freecycle.com.

Go ahead and judge me. Lord knows I've probably judged you twice today.


Main Course

Who do you talk to most often on the phone?

Eddie. Although you would have to make a distinction between "talk to" and "get harassed by."


Dessert

What level of responsibility do you have in your job?

I show up and help guests make copies. I refrain from throwing things. I cuss at the computer. I wear a worn-out, tattered uniform. That is my job, and I have two and a half more Fridays here before I can burn this fucking uniform and stop caring about the pot holes on River Road.

Friday's Feast

(Play along with Friday's Feasts here.)


Appetizer
How many times per day do you usually laugh?

Depends on the day. I laugh more at work than anywhere else. My job sucks, don't get me wrong, but I can chat online all day with Scottie and Rachel, and sling witty banter back and forth with Ed & Tasha. Sometimes I make myself laugh, like with that poem I wrote yesterday. That made me giggle.

If I'm low on laughs, though, I'll go watch this.


Soup
What do your sunglasses look like?

They look like whatever $2 will buy at the gas station when I'm in a really bad mood. I only buy them when the sun is in my eyes and giving me a headache, and I hate spending money on them because I always lose them.


Salad
You win a free trip to anywhere on your continent, but you have to travel by train. Where do you go?

South! It's -4 here right now. Of course if I'm going to go south on the train, it's better to do that in the spring or summer when everything is in bloom.


Main Course
Name one thing you consider a great quality about living in your town/city.

Just one? Holy shit. I like that we're the Second City. Nobody pays us any attention, and we can just do what we want. But we're not the third or tenth or 50th city. I've never been to NYC, but I've been to other cities and none of them holds a candle to Chicago. They're all tiny little things with depressing streets and morose citizens. The skylines aren't impressive and the sight-seeing is nothing at all to brag about. Chicago's not so big that every asshole on the planet is coming in to fuck it up, and it's not so small that I'm left dreaming about someplace big like NYC. I love it. It's home.


Dessert
If the sky could be another color, what color do you think would look best?

Another color? Oh no, no, that wouldn't do. All the colors that the sky takes on in a day - the early morning gray that greets the glorious, golden dawn. The technicolor dusk that grabs every warm color you could dream of and flings it out across the heavens, giving us one last magnificent light show before the horizon greedily gobbles orange flames and purple waves from the clouds and leaves us with a proud, stoic, dreamy blue that oozes into the sultry, slippery night.

And all of this is wrapped around the ordinary blue daytime sky. The kind of blue that when you stop and look - really look - you're reminded of what it's like to feel hope and wonder, what it's like to feel infinite.

What other colors are there? Green, I suppose. I hear that right before a tornado the sky turns green. You can keep that for your sky, I like to keep my green on the ground to lay on and climb in, where I can sit back, relax, and watch the sunset.

Friday's Feast

Appetizer
What is your favorite beverage?

Diet Coke.

Soup
Name 3 things that are on your computer desk at home or work

At home: My ukulele, my camera, my fake iPod (charging).

Salad
On a scale of 1-10 (with 10 being highest), how honest do you think you are?

8. And I'll save the other two points for white lies to get a job, refrain from making someone cry, and keep my mom from worrying too much about me.

Main Course
If you could change the name of one city in the world, what would you rename it and why?

I would call Gary, Indiana "Stinkerton" for reasons obvious to anybody who's driven through it.

Dessert
What stresses you out? What calms you down?

Stress: family, money, school, my car

Relax: Play my uke, play a game online with Rachel, go for a stroll, go on a photo spree (taking pictures...usually only calms me down when I'm with other photo addicts and/or taking pictures of inatimate objects), and dancing in my living room to anything my little heart desires.

Friday's Feast

The fest from today kind of sucked. I didn't like it. So I went back in the archives and got one from 2005. And so:



Appetizer
What is a word that your family uses that would not be considered common?

Onomonopiea. It's a real word, and it's not considered common.

Soup
What theme of calendar do you have on your wall this year?

None yet, but I still have last year's calendar of old maps up because I like it.

Salad
Name 3 people you speak with on a daily basis.

Ed, Scottie, and...um...well, I don't even talk to the two of them on a daily basis. Nearly, but not exactly. Marie, maybe. Or Brandi.

Main Course
If you could put a new tattoo on someone you know - who would it be, what would the tattoo be of, and where would you put it on them?

I guess I'd give my big sister a cute little dolphin on her ankle.

Dessert
What is the last beverage you drank out of a glass bottle?

Probably a Snapple.

Friday's Feast 1/4/08

Appetizer

When was the last time you received a surprise in the mail, and what was it? A few weeks ago a friend back east sent me a box with various things including a framed photo of her baby. A few months before that, she sent me a box with various things, including a monkey that does flips.

Soup

If you could have a summer and/or winter home, where would you want it to be?

Someplace beautiful, probably down south. Savannah maybe.

Salad
Pick one: pineapple, orange, banana, apple, cherry.

hahaha. What, in general? Pineapple. Fuck I love me some pineapple.

Main Course
Describe the nicest piece of clothing that you own.

A have a dress that I've never worn. It's pretty nice. I have some nice tops. All of my shoes are shit, though.

Dessert
If you could forget one whole day from your life, which day would you choose to wipe from your memory?

Well, it's been 15 minutes of trying to think of one, and I haven't come up with anything yet, so I'm going to have to pass on this one. I mean, yeah, there have been bad days, but I learned from them, so I'll keep 'em.

Friday's Feast

It's late. Such is life.



Appetizer
What was your first “real” job?

I worked at a camp for people with disabilities when I was 15. I learned all about working with people in wheel chairs, on crutches, deaf people, blind people, people who were playing quite a few cards short of a full deck. I took the job because it was an overnight camp and it meant I wouldn't have to spend endless, agonizing hours stuck at my dad's place with my step sister. Everyone says what a great first job that is, and how I'm a wonderful person for doing that for three summers, but basically it was just because I wanted to get the hell out of the house.

Soup
Where would you go if you wanted to spark your creativity?

I get on the el. Go downtown or just ride around.

Salad
Complete this sentence: I am embarrassed when…

I realize I've zoned out in public and I have no idea what I've been doing for the past few minutes. For all I know, I was scratching inappropriate places while standing in line at the grocery store.

Main Course
What values did your parents instill in you?

Don't be an asshole. Don't beg.

Dessert
Name 3 fads from your teenage years.

Big, big bangs on girls. Tall more than big, I guess. The "grunge" look (AKA the "Look! Maggie's finally in style!" era). Salt n Peppa. And now I have "What a Man" stuck in my head.

Friday's Feast

Friday's feast (via VH)

Appetizer
Which snack do you like to get when you go to the movies?

Reese's Pieces and a Diet Coke. Sounds redundant, right? I just like how Diet Coke tastes, so fuck off.

Soup
What year did you start using the internet? Um, maybe 1990. My brother put Norton Commander and Prodigy on Mom's computer and
viola, suddenly the computer wasn't just for video games any more.

Salad
What is your first name in Pig Latin?
Egmay


Main Course
Name something you are picky about.

Ketchup. When I got arrested last November (didn't have my insurance card on me) I was a little irritated that my big-ass bottle of ketchup was going to freeze while the car sat in impound. Dammit.

Dessert
Fill in the blanks: I _____ ______ yesterday and I ____ ____ today.

Made stew, got paid.