This is what I started to do on my last, ages-ago entry, before getting derailed by a rant about Hurricane Florence cancelling my only vacation plans for the entire year waaaahhhhh!!! And as an update, we did get a lot of rain but it was not an unusual amount for this place. And no more flooding than usual. The coast, however, had devastating flooding, and is STILL having flooding problems. And now Hurricane Michael is on the way. SIGH. But, back to the point:

How old will you be in 5 years?
SIXTY TWO. That is too shocking to process. I’m 57 now and even that looks like a ridiculous typo. If for some strange reason I didn’t know how old I am now and had to guess, I’d guess maybe mid-30s. Old enough to have experienced a lot, but still quite young.

How tall are you?
5’ 8ish, apparently. I was 5‘9 1/2 for years, so I thought, then got measured at 5‘8 last time anyone measured me. And when I measured myself in disbelief, yep, I was 5‘8. Apparently I am old enough to start shrinking. Yippie.

What are you looking forward to most in the next six weeks?
Ha, this was my derailing question last time I tried this survey. I see that six weeks brings us up to Thanksgiving, which I don’t really look forward to since these days it just involves Cracker Barrel To Go with my dad, and is kind of sad. I find it hard to look forward to anything this time of year- I hate winter, and here it comes. But okay, FINE, I’ll list some things I can actually look forward to:

…..
…..
….. OMG, I really do need to plan some fun things. I started to say “the pretty fall colors as the leaves change”, but it’s OCTOBER and we should be at the color peak right now.

Here’s a tree that would normally be in full color:

There are dead leaves all over the ground so I fear we’re in for a no-pretty-leaves fall. It’s been insanely hot, and they need a cold snap to change, apparently. I’m all for the hot weather, but I fear the backlash when it finally does get cold and we have below-0 temperatures for three months straight. There’s another thing I’m NOT looking forward to!

Outlander 4 starts sometime in November – I’m looking forward to that! Since that seems to be all I DO have to look forward to, I may ditch my initial plan of waiting till most of the episodes air and then getting Starz for a month so as to lessen the cost. Clearly I need the excitement sooner rather than later, and more than I need to save $10.

What’s the last movie you saw?
Well, this is quite timely, since we hardly ever watch movies anymore – we seem to be stuck on TV series instead – but we just finished watching Isle of Dogs last night. I say “just finished” because it took us THREE NIGHTS, since we’re used to TV shows and not a long movie. But it was fantastic- I highly recommend it and would definitely watch it again.

It’s by Wes Anderson who I have loved for years thanks to The Darjeeling Limited and The Royal Tennenbaums. He also did The Fantastic Mr. Fox, his other animation, which I also loved. Okay, I love everything he does.

Are your parents together?
My mom passed away a little over nine years ago, so not in this life. But they were till then – they were married over 60 years.

What colour are your eyes?
Blue/green/grey. They are changeable.

Where would you go if you could go anywhere?
England. I’d go for good if I could. And I’d leave right this minute.

Do you tan or burn?
I used to get a great tan, but now I just get a million freckles, and not the teeny cute ones I had when I was younger. Big splotchy ones. So I wear sunscreen and don’t do either one.

What did you fear was going to get you at night as a child?
Everything!! I was a fearful child. Especially at night… in the dark… Apparently I thought something dire was under my bed, since I still can’t sleep with any part of me hanging over the edge. I also have a very vivid memory of having a nightmare where there were, ummmmm, tropical fish all over the wall my that bed was pushed against. And for years I couldn’t sleep facing that wall. Not only was I fearful, apparently I had some extremely specific and very peculiar fears.

How many pillows do you sleep with?
One.

How many states/provinces have you lived in?
LOL, I just totally misread that and counted all the states I’ve been to!! Looks like about 25, mostly thanks to a bus trip to Orr Minnesota for a church camp when I was 15, and a road trip my family took to New Mexico when I was 16. There were a lot of states we passed through on both.

As far as states I’ve LIVED in: North Carolina, Georgia, and DC (yes, I know it’s a district, but it counts. That was actually quite a pain when we lived there as there were weird issues with living in a district as opposed to a state. I especially remember not being able to get cable TV there, when you could get it next door in Virginia).

So, three, which isn’t very many. Mostly it’s been NC, too.

Shoes, socks or bare feet?
Bare feet. I hate socks- actually that’s a strange thing about this fall too; I STILL haven’t had to pull out the socks. Amusingly, I clearly remember being very excited about starting first grade, until my mother told me I had to wear shoes. Then I’m all, “NOPE. Not going.”

What is your favourite dessert?
Anything chocolate. Seriously. ANYTHING. I don’t see much point to dessert if it isn’t chocolate. Well, or caramel. A combination is best of all.

What is your favourite kind of soup?
That’s a good question – apparently I’m not a big soup fiend since I can’t think of what my favorite would be. I like veggie soup, especially if it’s spicy, and I do love good tomato soup if it isn’t sweet, which is strangely hard to come by unless you make your own. I used to love French Onion soup but I had to give it up after I quit eating meat. I’m sure you can make veggie broth French Onion, though. Oh, potato soup!! That’s definitely a love.

Do you like coffee?
In the same way that I like breathing.

What do you drink in the morning?
Coffee. Lots and lots of coffee.

Do you like to cuddle?
Oddly enough, I am not a big fan of cuddling. I’d never even thought about it before. Weird. That probably means I need to learn to relax.

Have you ever been to Canada?
No, although I was very close during the aforementioned trip to Orr. It’s pretty close to the Canadian border, and some of the campers got to take a canoeing trip into Canada. The campers who were good at canoeing, which I was not. I was a mediocre canoer. I think it was a trip that lasted five or six days so the mediocre canoers didn’t make the cut.

Do you know anyone with the same birthday as you?
Quite a few. My uncle, a cousin’s kid, the woman who cuts my hair, a couple of FB friends. When I was in college I worked at a restaurant where it seemed like 9/10s of my coworkers were either born on June 3 or within that week.

Do you want kids?
No, which is a good thing as I’ve left it a bit late for that. Cats are all the kids I need.

Have you ever ridden in an ambulance?
I have – just once, and it was when I was a Junior in college. I’d just gotten my first car- an old very not-cool Nova which I was thrilled to have. I was driving home one weekend not long after the semester started. Going down one of the windy steep mountain roads, I lost control of the car, weaved all over the place, and went right off the side of the mountain. I still have no idea what happened- I wasn’t driving too fast, surprisingly, but it was raining and I think maybe my tire went off the edge and I over-corrected. Whatever the case, amazingly I wasn’t hurt badly but was shocked and banged up, and some fishermen who saw me wreck called an ambulance. The strangest thing is that during the ambulance ride I was remembering dreams I’d had- dream after dream, that I’d forgotten all about. I just laid there listening to the siren and remembering dreams. I’m sure it was from shock, and hitting my head.

LOL, “just once” is a total lie!! I had ANOTHER wreck 6 1/2 years ago, and ended up in an ambulance that time too! That was due to having a broken arm. That wreck at least wasn’t my fault – somebody pulled out right in front of me on the highway and I couldn’t avoid them. This ambulance ride didn’t involve recalling long lost dreams, though.

Do you prefer an ocean or a pool?
Definitely ocean. I don’t care for swimming and even though I used to be able to lie by the pool basking in the sun and reading all day long, now I’m bored in ten seconds. And don’t want to get any more freckly than I already am. You can take long long walks at the ocean! And I love looking at it and listening to it. Much better than a static pool.

What do you dip a chicken nugget in?
Nothing since I quit eating meat. And even prior to that I didn’t often have chicken nuggets – those things are nasty.

Have you ever run out of money?
Not in a long long time, happily. I ran out regularly when I was young and under-employed (ie working in restaurants) but we actually never run completely out anymore. It’s something I REALLY appreciate, too.

What is your usual bedtime?
Sometime between 11 and midnight usually, if it’s a work night. I can get up at 7 and still make it to work sort of on time, and I’m a night owl. If it’s not a work night I’ll stay up till 1 or 1:30.

Do you read the newspaper?
I read the NY Times and the Guardian online, at least bits and pieces of them. I used to read the Charlotte Observer front to back (Charlotte’s the closest big city to us) but I haven’t done that in years. I always look at the Apple News stories on my phone too. Being in the US, it’s like being in a war zone for years now, and I’m always afraid of missing news of the latest disaster. And as a result I live in a constant state of news-induced trauma. So I really should NOT read it but at the same time I HAVE to.

What was the last note you scribbled on a piece of paper?
I just scribbled the initials of all the states I’ve been to/through so I could count them. And I have scribbles all over all my many post-it notes here at my desk. Oh, also scribbled down some Publix coupon info in my little shopping list book. I’m always scribbling on bits of paper.

When was the last time you attended church?
I think that would be three or four years ago, when my niece’s twins were in a Christmas play at their church. We thought we were just going to see a play since it was in the evening, but it turned out to be an entire church service. Neither Baker B or I burst into flames, fortunately.

What is the longest you have ever camped out in a tent?
We used to camp pretty often when I was a teenager, although I don’t remember ever camping more than one night at a time. And that was a pop-up camper, not a tent, although it was such a basic no-frills one that it was like a tent with hard cots and a floor. We actually camped about half the time on the aforementioned family trip to New Mexico when I was 16, but didn’t stay anywhere more than one night and got motels every night or two. That’s been a LONG LONG time, though, and I have no desire whatsoever to go camping again. I am too fond of hot water and electricity and the internet. And not freezing and not having to walk to the toilets.

And I even actually have this luggage tag: