Tagged!

My friend Megan tagged me, which means that I'm supposed to share on my blog eight random things about myself that you might not know. I doubt that any one of you will find all eight of these surprising considering I think the people who read my blog know me pretty darn well, but, hey maybe there's a surprise tucked in here for someone.

1. Growing up there were three things I wanted to be: President, an astronaut, and a novelist. I kept the President dream up through 8th grade when I was student body president. Shortly after that I realized that a) I'm not good at schmoozing or selling myself, b) I am a very private person, and c) Politics is dirty. I kept the astronaut dream alive through my first year of college. I studied astronomy at GSP and went to Rice intending to study engineering and hoping to do some kind of work with nearby NASA. My inability to grasp physics effectively killed that dream. The novelist dream began early when I won my first Young Authors contest in first grade and has never really died, although it's been repressed at times primarily because it seemed like such an abstract thing and I've always been much too rational and responsible to just say screw it all I'm going to try to write a book. But, lately I've realized that a) I'm not going to starve and b) it's still the one thing I really want to do, so in a year or two I'm going to go ahead and say screw it, I'm writing a book.

2. I'm afraid of dogs. There's no reason for this--I've never been bitten or had a bad experience. I'm just highly uncomfortable around them. (Although Jeff is convinced that I secretly like them.)

3. I am terrible at relaxing. I can't sit on the couch and watch TV without feeling like I should be doing something more productive. I can't lay on the beach or at the pool for more than 15 minutes without getting restless. A resort vacation would be my worst nightmare. I always need to be doing something, seeing something, learning something. Reading is the closest thing I can do to relaxing guiltlessly.

4. I'm a book junkie. I read everything I can get my hands on. And if you talk to me when I'm reading, I won't answer you. I'm not being rude, I just get so absorbed in reading that I literally do not hear you talking to me. When I was a kid I loved books so much that when my family went to the lake, I'd bring a book and read while everyone else fished or swam or whatever.

5. I'm actually very silly, but only around people I am very close to. Around others, I come across as very reserved and serious.

6. I have never in my life eaten a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I like peanut butter sandwiches and I've been known to eat jelly bread for breakfast, but the idea of combining the two makes my stomach churn.

7. I'm almost always cold (or chilly as I like to say). Unless it's over 90 degrees and I'm in direct sunlight, I'm probably cold.

8. When I was little, I had a Madonna tape (from my cousin Lisa I think) with the song Like a Virgin on it. My next door neighbor and I used to dance to this song while wearing halos or wings and acting like angels. This is because I thought virgin meant angel thanks to the Church always referring to Mary as the Virgin Mary. It seemed like a logical leap to me...Who would have thought they'd reference someone's level of sexual experience so often in a religious place?

Now it's my turn to tag eight people...except I don't think I know eight people who have blogs, so um, if I know you and you have a blog and haven't been tagged before, consider yourself it.