Meme: Fifty shades of personal detail...

[magnetic_pole]

1. What’s your favorite candle scent? You know, I've never liked scented candles, but now we have a smoker next door, so perhaps I'd better think about this issue more carefully. Any suggestions?
2. What female celebrity do you wish was your sister? None. Does anyone really want the paparazzi on their doorstep?
3. What male celebrity do you wish was your brother? Why are we expected to have separate male and female celebrities? I mean, I can see "Which movie star would you like to look like?" or "Which famous chef do you wish invited you to visit at the holidays?" or "Which sports star do you wish belonged to your gym?," but why is gender the most important attribute here?
4. How old do you think you’ll be when you get married? Legally, in the eyes of the US government? I don't know, mid-forties? (I'm forty-ish right now.) After many years of skepticism, I think it's coming.
5. Do you know a hoarder? Do I know people who collect things excessively? Yes. People who hoard compulsively? No.
6. Can you do a split? No. Wow. I'm looking carefully to see who answers "yes" to this one!
7. How old were you when you learned how to ride a bike? Five-ish, perhaps?
8. How many oceans have you swam in? I swam in the Pacific as a child (I lived only about half an hour from the beach.) As an adult, I've dipped my toes in the Atlantic and pulled them right out. The ocean's cold! How did I stay in for hours at a time, as a child?
9. How many countries have you been to? US, Mexico, Canada, Australia, UK, Ireland, Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Italy, France, Greece, Romania, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Croatia, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, Thailand = 22
10. Is anyone in your family in the army? No one of my parents' generation or mine. My grandfather was in the army during the Second World War, which is one of the few things I know about him.
11. What would you name your daughter if you had one? The better half and I actually have a name for an imaginary daughter, which I like enormously. I don't think we're going to get to use it, though.
12. What would you name your son if you had one? We also have a name for an imaginary son...but it's a joke, because we can't quite imagine having a boy. Perhaps we should come up with one, just to be fair.
13. What’s the worst grade you got on a test? A B+, and I don't say that with pride. I'd be a better person if I could have loosened up in high school and college and didn't pride myself on getting everything perfect, every time.
14. What was your favorite TV show when you were a child? Little House on the Prairie.
15. What did you dress up as on Halloween when you were eight? No idea. Always dressed up, though.
16. Have you read any of the Harry Potter, Hunger Games or Twilight series? I've read a bit of each and, ahem, studied HP like a religious text.
17. Would you rather have an American accent or a British accent? This question isn't hypothetical for me, so it doesn't make much sense. But the odd thing is that, given the cultural references here, I don't think it's hypothetical for the meme-writer, either. What's really going on with this question?
18. Did your mother go to college? The first in her family to do so. She still sees her education as the single most important determinate of her adult life.
19. Are your grandparents still married? Only one grandparent is still alive, but the one set I knew had an amazing, loving, fifty-year relationship.
20. Have you ever taken karate lessons? That requires both a level of aggression and physical coordination that I lack.
21. Do you know who Kermit the frog is? I do. Is the implication that the younger generation doesn't?
22. What’s the first amusement park you’ve been to? Disneyland. When I was young, they used to let locals visit cheaply in the winter months, so I always associate it with jackets and scarves, which is a little ridiculous for a California amusement park which is pleasant if not hot ten months a year.
23. What language, besides your native language, would you like to be fluent in? Er, anything? It's a bit ridiculous that everyone in my part of the world doesn't learn Spanish, though. We should all be multilingual.
24. Do you spell the color as grey or gray? Gray.
25. Is your father bald? Getting there, one year at a time.
26. Do you know triplets? Only The Triplets of Bellville.
27. Do you prefer Titanic or The Notebook? Neither. More interestingly: what's this supposed to say about me? Do I like tragic/epic over happy endings? (Does The Notebook have a happy ending?)
28. Have you ever had Indian food? I have. And I eat it as often as I can, in fact.
29. What’s the name of your favorite restaurant? There's a little pho place down the street that's our most dependable destination.
30. Have you ever been to Olive Garden? Yes! And, what's more, enjoyed it. I'm not a gourmet when it comes to chain restaurants.
31. Do you belong to any warehouse stores (Costco, BJ’s, etc.)? No, but my love for the Target down the block is deep and abiding.
32. What would your parents have named you if you were the opposite gender? My brother's name, actually.
33. If you have a nickname, what is it? Just the one you know, online!
34. Who’s your favorite person in the world? The better half.
35. Would you rather live in a rural area or in the suburbs? I can't believe I'm about to say this, since leaving the suburbs was the leitmotif of my youthful fantasies, but suburbs over rural areas, any day. Rural New England has cured me of any romantic notions of the countryside.
36. Can you whistle? No.
37. Do you sleep with a nightlight? No.
38. Do you eat breakfast every morning? Absolutely! Often in the afternoon or evening, too. I love breakfast.
39. Do you take any pills or medication daily? Just one, which I'm easing off of.
40. What medical conditions do you have? None.
41. How many times have you been to the hospital? Just once for the night, when I shattered my left elbow. I'm now bionic, with two dozen metal parts inside me.
42. Have you ever seen Finding Nemo? No.
43. Where do you buy your jeans? I buy the same ones every time from a department store online. This is my ideal version of shopping (and fashion): re-ordering the same jeans, tee-shirts, and v-neck sweaters every once in a while, when unfixable holes develop.
44. What’s the last compliment you got? "You're so smart." The better half, buttering me up. That one works every time.
45. Do you usually remember your dreams in the morning? Almost always, though I try to forget them immediately, because I tend to dream violent, stressful dreams. I'm always a bit relieved to wake up.
46. What flavor tea do you enjoy? Twinings English Breakfast.
47. How many pairs of shoes do you currently own? I've got six fall-winter-spring shoes out (two black loafers, two brown, one pair of tennies, and a set of flip flops for wandering around the house) and perhaps another six pairs of sandals in the closet. In an ideal world I'd wear sandals all the time.
48. What religion will you raise your children to practice? That's assuming I have children, and assuming you can raise them to do anything, much less subscribe to a belief system.
49. How old were you when you found out that Santa wasn’t real? Was it so traumatic I forgot it? I truly don't remember.
50. Why do you have a tumblr? Because it's simple to post pictures! And the sheer number of interesting images out there astounds me everyday.