Things That Make You Go Hmmmmm.....

There seems to be a lot of blagging (my word for blog tagging) going on lately. Shelly from This Eclectic Life has asked me to write 10 utterly fascinating, interesting and maybe even shocking secrets about myself. Unable to resist her challenge, here goes...

1. I can write limericks with the best of them. I would be an awesome rapper if only I had some bling and could get that crotch grabbing thing down pat.


There's a super fab blogger called Rock Chick
Who schmoozes her fans with some pretty good schtick
She hereby proclaims
That words are her game
Admitting, at times, the schtick might be laid on a bit thick.

2. I am terrified of cotton balls. Yes, that’s right. (It’s a legitimate phobia!) Did you know you can manage to function while being afraid of cotton balls until you have elementary school aged children? Apparently, there is some cottonballesque period in art that my college art professor failed to mention. It requires all small children to draw pictures of eskimos and surround the hoods of the parkas with cotton balls. These masterpieces must be then be displayed down the main hallway of the school during parent teacher conferences. Let’s just say the whole incident forced me to admit I had a problem. People were staring. I had no choice.

3. Once a coworker snuck up behind me at a Christmas party dressed as Santa Claus. He grabbed me from behind and when I turned around, my face went right into his beard. His COTTON BALL beard. Since then, I haven’t been all that big fan of Santa, either.

4. I was a runner up many moons ago in the Miss Illinois pageant. I really like tiaras. In the hopes of getting one, I played the piano and sang “The Rose”. I lost to a baton twirler. I’m not saying that baton twirling isn’t talent, it surely is, but I think ultimately it came down to cleavage and mafia connections. Both of hers were way better than mine.

5. I have a stronger than probably normal interest in serial killers. When I was growing up, my very own neighbor was none other than John Wayne Gacy. When the news of his horrific acts broke, I begged my dad to let me watch them work at the crime scene and he took me as close as we could get. I know you’re thinking this is a terrible thing to take a child to, but I was somewhat of a persistent and determined little kid. He knew I would go with or without him. Since then I have been fascinated with the biographies and psychological profiles of serial killers. I've wanted to work in Law Enforcement from that moment on.

6. Most kids want to be doctors, lawyers, teachers or police officers when they grow up. Not me. Not from the beginning, anyway. Prior to my serial killer encounter, I wanted to be a high heel wearing cashier. (How’s that for career aspirations?) To this day, I still love the stilettos and pushing buttons. Granted, I am now pushing other people’s buttons instead of cash register buttons. Hey, buttons are buttons. Some things never change.

7. I just ordered my Obama ’08 button from the Barack Obama store. I really like him. I don’t normally wear political paraphernalia on my person but I figure this will make my annoying coworker positively insane. There’s those darn buttons again!

8. I saved someone’s life once. I was at work answering 911 calls and a hysterical woman called saying that her two year old was choking on a grape for several minutes and was now completely limp, blue and not breathing. She had absolutely no idea what to do. Despite TV shows like “Rescue 911” where dispatchers give out emergency medical information all the time over the phone, we did not do this at the department where I worked. In fact, it was frowned upon under any circumstances. I had a two year old of my own at the time and to me, limp, blue and not breathing pretty much means dead. Not to sound callous, but there’s little you can do to further harm an already dead person, so I instructed her on how to do the Heimlich Maneuver while the ambulance responded. Within seconds she was back on the line and said that the grape popped out, but he still wasn’t breathing, so I gave her CPR instructions. When the paramedics arrived, the little boy was breathing on his own. The paramedics decided to use this instance as the basis for the need for Emergency Medical Dispatch within the community and put me in for a Letter of Commendation. I didn’t get one. I got suspended for three days without pay for violating the policy of not giving out emergency medical information over the telephone. It was worth it. Sometimes rules are meant to be broken. Hopefully, today that boy is a healthy 15 year old.

9. I love gambling at very low stakes. High stakes make me nervous. I’m a pretty darn good poker player (especially online where you don’t need a poker face) and I love blingy, noisy slot machines that dump buckets of nickels and the betting counter at horse races. In the summer on Friday afternoons, I like to go to the race track. I just love when the horses run by and everyone starts screaming! I pick my horses by name just like the pros do. (That is how they do it, isn’t it?)

10. I’m pretty good at doing impressions of people. Middle Daughter inherited this talent from me and she even used it against me once. It was Christmas and my whole entire family (in-laws included) was there and we were all playing “Guess Who I Am?”. It’s a little impressionistic game I made up so that I can legitimately poke a little fun at people. It was Middle Daughter’s (she was about 5 at the time) turn to play. She stood up, gave herself a wedgie, dropped her pants and mooned the family with her underwear stuck up her butt crack. If I hadn't started choking and falling off the couch, perhaps no one would have guessed that “Victoria” and I shared a “Secret” adoration for thong underwear.

Shhhhhhh. Don’t tell. I know my secrets are safe with you :)