My friend Kelly "awarded" me a blog assignment. I'm supposed to come up with ten "honest crap" things about myself to share with you. She shared ten "honest crap" things about herself and as usual she made me laugh out loud. She even mentioned me in it... I was quite flattered! I've had an especially hectic week (and Brett has not been cooperative) so I only managed to come with five "honest crap" things about myself.
So here goes....

1.) I have a staring problem. I'm not conscious of doing it but I have had a few people suggest that I take a picture--"because it will last longer." Friends have kindly pointed out that my staring sometimes comes across as rude and quite frankly, kind of weird. I am trying to curb it, but my uncanny recollection of physical details suggests that I haven't been successful. Often if I am asked if I've ever met so and so, I might try and ascertain her identity with something like, "Are you talking about the girl with the small feet and the semi-big nostrils?" Bingo. That's the one.

2.) I've never been impressed with celebrities. When we were little, my cousin Stacey insisted she was in love with Tom Jones. She had all of his albums and posters of him taped to the walls of her bedroom. How could you be in love with someone you didn't even know....or even met before? This was the height of silliness in my mind. I can distinctly remember being aggravated that she would rather moon over pictures of Tom Jones than play with Chrissy and Velvet. Chrissy and Velvet were dolls that had hair that you could crank in and out of their skulls, depending on whether you wanted them to have long or short hair. They were very cool dolls...much cooler than Tom Jones.

3.) I don't like to sing. Driving home from church one Sunday I inexplicably, out of the blue, screeched out "He could have called 10,000 angels!" The car literally rocked with laughter. I wasn't surprised that my brothers were laughing at me but my mom was doubled over with laughter, too. Shockingly enough, even my dad was laughing. Mortified, I immediately started crying. But even my tears didn't serve to stifle my mom's laughter. When she was finally able to catch her breath, she tried to explain (amid fresh bouts of laughter) that it wasn't that it was bad singing, it was just the incredibly high notes I hit that had spawned all the hilarity. Whatever. That happened when I was in fourth grade and I haven't tried to belt out a note since.

4.) I am fiercely patriotic. I know I am blessed to live in the greatest country on earth. I am always moved by a well done performance of the Star Spangled Banner (like Jennifer Hudson's at the Super Bowl). The first time I flew into Alaska my heart swelled with the realization that this is what they meant by "purple mountains majesty!" America truly is beautiful "from sea to shining sea."

5. )I'm just now learning to appreciate music. My cousin (the same one who was in love with Tom Jones) plays the violin. She plays it beautifully. She plays it in symphonies. When we were younger, she played it at every family get together. I can remember praying she would forget to bring her violin. She never did. It seemed like an interminable amount of time that we had to sit still and listen to her play. I was especially impatient with the whole tuning rigmarole. Why did she have to tune it every time? How could it get un-tuned so fast anyway? Now I love hearing her play.

Not long ago I tuned in to an Academy Awards show just as they were handing out the award for best musical score (a snoozer of an award). To illustrate just how important a movie's musical score is, they showed clips from movies without the music. The hills were definitely not alive watching Maria running around on them without the music, and the shark in Jaws didn't seem nearly as menacing. Music does make all the difference.

I have come so far in my appreciation of music that American Idol is one of only two shows that I regularly watch on T.V.

So there you have it. Five totally "honest crap" things about myself.