Friday, February 15, 2008

Tag, I'm it...

Jennifer tagged me, and others, to 'splain seven things about me that few people know about me. Like her, I could likely go on at least forever if not longer with arcane and creepy things about me that you don't know.
Maybe you might find something in common with me ( poor you ) and you won't be so lonely in life knowing that there is another nut job out there that may be something like you.

1) I am a former tree-hugging dirt-worshipper. Also known as - not to offend anyone here but it has to be said - Democrat; Liberal; Big-Goverment Lover or It-Takes-A-Village Type.
No kidding! Having been raised on the government dole and until I discovered a little thing called personal responsibility, I lived to wait for the guv'ment check to arrive. I remember the monthly trips with my brother and Dad to the local jail to pick up the pile of commodities ( 'real' food that was the precursor to food stamps ). We would then feast on canned pork, dried eggs, dried milk and enough corn meal to make a nearly infinite number of cornbread pones until the last week in the month when things would thin a bit unless there was enough money left from the check to buy some Uncle Charlies cubed beef that Mom would bread up using the commodity flour and fried in commodity lard and serve with commodity dehydrated potatoes.
Please realize that my memory of this is some forty years old ( making me about eight at the time ) and I actually remember this with great fondness but that doesn't make it right.
I grew into a young man thinking that the government was the giver of all things fair and wonderful. Until I was about thirteen, I helped my Mom spend the checks on things that we didn't need ( she was frugal and new the value of a dollar, me on the other hand... )
Then...

2) I am staunch Republican ( Reagonomics; Supply-Sider; Personal Responsibility and all of the things and more that Liberals hate. ) Since the time that my Mom said that we didn't have enough money to buy the crap that I thought that I deserved and her suggestion that I actually get a job to make my own money. So off I went up the hill to do odd jobs for Mrs. Moss at her store up the street. After I got a small taste of the real money that could be made by actually earning it, I took to working at the Rockhouse after school and I haven't looked back.

3) I used to weigh three hundred ten pounds. Sixteen years old, six foot two and size forty eight pants and dateless will make you do desperate things so I took to losing weight. Fifteen or so years later I was at my lowest of one hundred sixty two pounds in size thirty three pants. I must say that I was diggin' life. I appeared gaunt ( the bad kind ) but I felt great! I may have felt great but those around me constantly bombarded me with questions about whether I had cancer and other life-threatening maladies. I started to gain weight and I have leveled out at -about- two hundred pounds which I am mostly happy.

4) I know twenty seven different computer languages. And they are none of which you have ever heard of or would recognize if I told you what they were. They are all specialized languages used in industrial computers or robots. I may not be able to format a letter in Microsoft Word but I can make a four thousand ton injection molding machine purr like a kitten, albeit a VERY LARGE kitten.

5) I am a stroke survivor. Late 1993 ( or was it '94 ) an aneurism burst deep in the left parietal lobe of my brain. It took my ability to speak clearly for a good while but I am pretty much back to 100%. Thanks to all for the prayers and good wishes because they pulled me through.

6) I have a great memory! No really! A really great memory... for numbers. I can remember phone numbers for people long dead and even the odd address.

7) I have a terrible memory! No, really! I have a really bad memory... for names. There are people that I have worked with for eighteen years that I could not tell you their name if my life depended on it. I have forgotten my own name but it usually comes back to me before I need to go fetching my driver's license. I feel sorry for KiKi and RoRo when I am around them because I am constantly calling them by the other's name. It can be embarrassing unless you can make a game out of it.

There you have it. Seven worthless facts about me. Please don't think less of me because they aren't too exciting. I never promised that they would be worth reading.