facebook: 25 Things…

Unless you’re in that 1% online population that doesn’t have Facebook, I’m sure you’ve seen this:

Rules: Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you.

Chris offered a theory that this might actually be someone’s sociology project and is just seeing how fast it spreads. Considering how quickly people were submitting theirs and tagging their friends, I’m inclined to believe it. I normally don’t participate in this sort of thing, but a part of me sees it as an interesting way to get to know people that you, to be honest, don’t know that much about. Or considering the nature of Facebook, don’t know that much about anymore.

I don’t know if these are considered random enough, but as I was coming up with them, it started opening up the floodgates of memory and I realized that I didn’t really want this content on Facebook’s servers, especially when I have my own blog! So here they are, I’m not tagging anyone else, you are free to make comment here or on Facebook or not at all. I have to admit, this was fun, but next time just stick to posting more pictures of cats!

1. I hate making ice. This is likely my number one nonsensical thing about me. If I don’t have a fridge with an icemaker, chances are I’ll never have ice unless I stop by the store. I’m well aware of how easy it is to make ice and have it on hand, and my penchant for martinis should behoove me to get over this, but it hasn’t happened yet.
2. I hate memes, just like this one. Also polls, quizzes, generators, etc. with the exception of the Lorem Ipsum generator. I first saw them on LiveJournal and it seemed to me to be non-content and a time waster. Considering the people I’ve seen talking about how much time they spent on the “25 Things” meme, that still holds true.
3. I always buy baby carrots at the grocery store. I can never use them all in time and they spoil. I always buy baby carrots at the grocery store. It’s a vicious cycle.

4. I’ve never had a non-long-distance relationship last longer than a year. I enjoy dating, though not all aspects of courting, and relationships but I don’t seem to have found the right guy. A running joke was that if a guy lasted more than 6 months, he either must be something special or he was eyeing the exits. I have gotten back together with guys that I’ve dated, but it’s usually been after a long enough time that it couldn’t be considered “a break.”
5. My work ethic and ideas about office culture were formed by my parents’ generation. You went to work every day, even if you didn’t like the job, and you did your job all day. It was a matter of personal pride more than pitching in towards the company’s success. Appearance, decorum, interpersonal relationships, time on task… they’re all very different in my head than what seems to be the norm these days. I don’t mind being a little old school in this way, but I’ve noticed it turns me into much more of a grumpy old man around the office. Still, Nine to Five remains one of my favorite movies to this day and it also had a great deal of influence on my ideas about office culture. This was reinforced when I one day visited my mother’s office. She was working for the IRS at the time and walking onto her floor, it looked exactly like the offices in the movie.
6. When I see certain products advertised on TV, I am not tempted to pick up the phone and call, but I am tempted to see if they’ve made it to my local Target’s “As Seen on TV” aisle. I did buy the wireless light switch and it works exactly as advertised and I couldn’t be more pleased with it. But Vince? I am not gonna love your nuts.
7. As a foodie, I’m sure I’m not alone in this. When I cook on my own at home, I pretend that I’m hosting my own cooking program. My style is more like PBS than Food Network, sort of a Julia meets Ina meets Nigella. I’ve also found that this hosting extends to some cleaning or other DIY projects. I do have very brief moments of “Who am I talking to?” but they soon pass.
8. I cannot interior decorate to save my life. As with most things, my living space is arranged around efficiency more than anything else. I don’t often have pictures on the walls, my furniture will be comfy, but perhaps not “go” together and the thing I pay the most attention to, looks and comfort wise, is my bed. As such, my place often resembles that of a college student. I don’t buy into the masculine/feminine thing for a future mate, but I do hope he has more interior design sense than I do.
9. I am a non-white, non-heterosexual, non-christian male. This has made it difficult to celebrate some victories when at the same time huge defeats are suffered. It probably also makes it very difficult for advertisers to lock me into a demographic. Politics and religion remain #1 on my list of non-starters/conversation killers.
10. I am a UK-phile. I could probably blame this on a steady diet of PBS growing up, especially Britcoms and Dr. Who. I have been warned that if I ever visited the UK, I would likely put down new roots and never come back home. This has also caused me to loathe any television shows that US networks copy/steal from the UK and use my special antenna to get shows straight from the source.
11. Even with knowledge of #8, I am convinced that if I ever bought a real house, not a condo/apartment, that I would turn into the Black Gay Martha Stewart (some might say this has already happened). Probably losing all my urban bohemian cred and developing a sudden desire to dress everything in pastels and gingham. This would also pave the way for my eventual domestic media empire.
12. I’m a recovering shop-a-holic. When I was a kid, my mother was a coupon/rebate queen. Our basement had file racks full of boxes containing UPCs and labels from everything we consumed so that she would be able to qualify for nearly any rebate she saw, even if she hadn’t used the actual product in months. This taught me how to seek out a good deal and almost never pay full price for anything. It just took me a while to realize that not paying full price was still paying. I have since become more of a power shopper and my bank account and credit are recovering. Although I still get a little thrill when I shop at the local Safeway and the bottom of the receipt tells me what percentage I saved on my groceries. (25% this morning!)
13. I grew up in the suburbs outside Atlanta. My neighborhood was primarily white, but somewhat diverse. I’m not hard to spot in any of my elementary school class photos. Even though it was his decision to move our family to the ‘burbs, after a while my father decided we needed to be around more Black families. We joined social groups, went on excursions into the “real city” and while I made some friends, it never really took. I have been called “one of the whitest black men there is” but if I hadn’t assimilated into the culture that I lived in, attended school, etc. I’m not sure who I’d be now, but I am sure that I would have gotten beaten up and teased a lot more than I did for being a nerd.
14. The first 4 years of my life were in Delaware, then 14 in Georgia (where I grew up), 3 in Florida, 4 in Delaware again and now over a decade in Washington, DC. I have no Southern accent and I don’t think that I have any other regional affectations or oddities. It’s rare that people can tell where I’m from.
15. I usually cut and/or “do” my own hair. Sometimes that is painfully obvious, other times people have been surprised that I don’t go to a salon. I don’t mind going to professionals for haircuts, but in the places where it isn’t thinning, my hair grows back pretty quickly so it feels like a lot of money down the drain if I can’t cut or at least touch it up myself.
16. I don’t have celebrity crushes. The rational part of my brain often takes over and says, “Even if he were gay, single and the two of you were trapped in an elevator for 8 hours, it still wouldn’t happen.” I admire the work of singers and movie stars and I will become a loyal fan, but I’ve never watched a show, movie or listened to an album for the reason: he’s so hot. This has caused me to not see a lot of shows that are sub-par but with pretty people in it and I’ve never felt that I missed out on anything. However when it comes to porn stars, all bets are off since it’s sort of their job to be hot and to get you hot for them.
17. While I’ve done nothing to pursue it since living in DC, I’d still love to get back into acting. My first ever audition, my mother pushed me into doing it, it was for an independent movie and it was a cold reading. I was still pretty young and innocent and when I saw my lines, they were filled with swear words. It was also calling for a little more of an urban inflection than this kid from the ‘burbs had at the time. Needless to say, it was one of the worst experiences of my life. In the few times that I’ve watched American Idol and they show the judges’ jaws drop at how bad someone is? Yeah, it was like that.
18. I hate Reality TV. No exceptions. I don’t think it’s clever or requires any talent and creativity and I’m mortified that it’s actually become a genre. My most hated types are competition reality and intervention/rehab reality. This dislike of these types of shows, for me, goes all the way back to The People’s Court. Some talk shows are tolerable, but only barely. Reality shows aren’t a dealbreaker when dating someone, so long as they don’t expect me to watch with them. If I do watch with them, they’d best be prepared for a steady stream of snark.
19. Even though I’ve lived in places where it gets really hot or really cold, I’m still a weather wimp. I’ve only just noticed this year that I’m sort of getting used to DC’s up & down Winter weather. On my few trips to the West Coast, I realized that I could live quite happily in a place where the temps bounced between lows of 40s and highs of 70s year-round.
20. To borrow from Judy Gorman and Erykah Badu, “I’m an analog girl in a digital world.” Much as I love my gadgets and my tech, I still miss old school methods–this would never be me. I enjoy writing and receiving letters, I love phone calls, I prefer face to face laughs with friends. I acknowledge that social networking, e-mail, text messages and IMs allow more means of communication, but I often feel we’ve sacrificed quality for quantity.
21. While going to college in Florida, I won a prize in Club Park Avenue’s, the local queer night club, Halloween costume in the Drag category. It was a costume I threw together at a friend’s house at the last minute–back when I was a size 6. I spent 30 mins on it, all told, and I beat out other queens that really went all out on their costumes. I didn’t choose to enter, I was nudged forward by the guy I was sort of dating, Sam Pennypacker (his real name), when the hostess, drag queen Toni Denise asked, “Who out there is in drag?” I called myself Grace, did a little walk and turn and won by audience applause. I have never entered a costume contest since.
22. Regardless of the circumstances, whether it was due to a falling out or just a gradual drift, I miss every friend I’ve ever lost. So many of the good experiences I’ve had were with friends, and every time I relate a story involving someone I don’t speak to anymore, it makes me a little sad. The same doesn’t always hold true for ex-boyfriends, with them I mostly just miss the good times.
23. I became a huge Janet Jackson fan in high school and from then through college would watch her music videos until I could match them step for step. I can still do most of them, but I’ve commuted that video dance desire to Beyonce’s videos these days. Yes, I can do “Single Ladies”. Younger me did it for the fun, older me considers it a really good form of cardio. At least that’s what I tell myself.
24. I devoured Douglas Adams’ “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” when I first borrowed a copy in college. Since then I have acquired the original audio broadcast, the original tv special, later books, live readings, even the new movie. I have read it so many times that there’s usually a line or quote from it ready to pop out of my mouth at all times. No matter how much other nerdity I may also like, The Guide is probably the core of my love of science fiction, everything else seems to branch off from that.
25. I honestly don’t think that I’m terribly interesting. I am the moron that answers the dating question, “So tell me about yourself.” with “What would you like to know?” The friends that I keep, and the visitors to my blog, flickr, twitter, Facebook, etc. should prove that this is not the case. If you’ve made it down this far, congratulations, color me shocked and I am never doing anything like this again.