25 Random Things About Me - Redux

There is a big craze sweeping Facebook lately. It's a survey, "25 things about me." You list 25 things about yourself that people may or may not know, then you "tag" a bunch of your Facebook friends to do the survey. So, several weeks ago I did the survey and tagged people, who have in turn done the survey and tagged other people, so I've been having a great time reading all these survey answers! The only thing is, now I'm completely dissatisfied with my original survey answers, so I've decided to do it again. This time, I'm also adding it as a blog post. So, here goes!

1. I went to Cornell College, in Mt. Vernon, Iowa, which has a "One Course at a Time" teaching philosophy. You take one course for 3 1/2 weeks, have 4 1/2 days off, then start a brand new class. Learning is very intensive, and class time is somewhere between 2-5 hours a day, depending on the class. If you want to compare it to a traditional semester system, one day at Cornell is like a week at a traditional college/university.
2. In my very first class at Cornell, Intro. to Philosophy, our professor LOVED to throw pop quizzes. His requirement for answering the questions on those pop quizzes: you must answer each question in ONE grammatically correct sentence. One sentence only. This has stuck with me ever since.
3. I used to be painfully shy. Those of you who knew me in grade school/middle school/high school probably remember this. I was also really scared of being teased/made fun of, which actually rarely ever happened, with the exception of one certain person, and who I allowed to destroy my self-confidence for years. But when you're a kid, you don't understand that other people do not have control over you, so it took me a very long time to realize that I'm a pretty cool person.
4. My daughter, on the other hand, does not take after me in this regard. She is outgoing, always eager to make new friends, and doesn't worry what other people think. She isn't afraid to stand up in front of people and speak, and she is one of the best young actors I've ever encountered.
5. I completed my MLIS degree completely online without ever having to set food on the Univ. of Wisconsin - Milwaukee campus. I find this absolutely amazing.
6. The act of censorship angers me more than I can express. Censor yourself, censor what your kids read, but DO NOT even try to make those decisions for other people or other people's children.
7. One of my favorite movies is Field of Dreams and I watch it every February when I really need a dose of Iowa green. What's funny about this is that when I saw the movie for the first time, I was not an Iowa fan yet, even though I lived here, and the first time you hear: "Is this Heaven? No, it's Iowa," in the movie, I laughed out loud in the theatre. I was the only one who laughed out loud. But, I get it now.
8. I don't miss being married. Sometimes I get a little twinge when I see two people together who are very much in love and respect each other, but the twinge is more of a "what a great relationship those people have" rather than a "I wish I had that."
9. My daughter is the world to me. She is such an amazing person and I delight in watching her grow into herself.
10. When I was a kid, I thought the perfect day would be to spend the entire day in the library, reading whatever I wanted and wandering all over the library, and eating lunch at the nearby donut shop. I thought it would be heaven! And now I am a librarian, so go figure......
11. I love to travel and will happily go to places I've never been, but at the same time I'm also a homebody and love being in my home and puttering around. I need my downtime, especially on weekends, and don't like to be on the go all the time.
12. I am rarely bored. I enjoy my own company.
13. Last year, on my trip to Napa, Washington and Oregon with my dear friend Janice, I got pulled over for speeding. 73 mph in a 55 mph zone. I was freaking out, until a red pickup truck drove by us so fast he made our car shake! Needless to say, the Oregon state trooper ran back from his squad car to return my license to me, and sped off after the pickup without giving me a speeding ticket!
14. It took me a very long time to know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I did a bunch of different things - music sales, customer service, corporate training, business analyst (that was weird, too), stay-at-home mom, and then one day I applied for a part-time library position. And the rest is history. Once I started at the library, I knew I found my vocation. Being a librarian is exactly what I'm supposed to be doing.
15. I am immune to the chickenpox. No kidding. My mom thinks I might have had one pox on my face when I was about a year old, but she wasn't really sure. Other than that maybe pox, I've never had an actual case of chickenpox. When I was pregnant with Gillian, my bloodwork came back stating I'm immune from the chickenpox. The only thing I can think of is that my mom had the chickenpox right before she was pregnant with me and passed on her immunity to me.
16. I am VERY grateful to be in contact with friends who were very dear to me growing up. Facebook is wonderful. I think it is very important to have friends who knew you "when." I love that I am in contact with a great group of people from my DeKalb days and a great group of people from my Cornell days.
17. I am extremely critical of myself and spend too much time comparing myself to others. In my heart I know that this is a complete waste of my time and energy, but I have yet to learn to cut myself a break. I am much more forgiving of others than of myself.
18. I find absurd and random things exceptionally funny, especially when they happen out of the blue. I also have a tendency to want to laugh at inappropriate times, and trying not to laugh just makes it worse.
19. I firmly believe that a hot cup of tea can cure just about anything.
20. At work, I am much happier and more productive if I have a little too much to do.
21. I hate alarm clocks, and the best thing about weekends and vacations is not having to set my alarm clock!
22. I am a good listener, and will lend an ear, or a shoulder to cry on, at any time. I am, however, not good at letting others do this for me. It's been a long time since I've "put myself out there." I think sometimes it comes off as superficiality, but it really is just being afraid to stick my neck out and risk being vulnerable.
23. I often think that, as an adult, I don't have a clue what I'm doing, and at any moment, everyone else will think that about me, too.
24. I am skeptical of organized religion. Not to be confused in any way with faith. Religious people make me nervous. I also believe that religious people are not faith based, and faith based people are not religious. They are completely different. I think about this quite a lot.
25. Lately, I've been fascinated with biographies and autobiographies, and I love looking through the photographs that you find in the middle of many bios. I love the opportunity to get a glimpse into people's lives.