The thing about blogging is wondering exactly what people want to read- for instance, I almost didn’t publish that last post on cantaloupe jam because I had this second thought after writing it that no one really cared two cents about cantaloupe jam.   I was very pleasantly surprised to see that indeed some of you actually like hearing about cantaloupe jam.  I always get a little thrill when I hear how much someone likes this blog – this whole thing started on a lark trying to keep a lost then found creative spark that is so much a part of me that I don’t ever want to lose it again.   In a little internet game of tag you’re it, Meridith over at Counting Chickens gave me a little shout-out along with a list of questions that were optional for me to answer.  And if you know me, you know that I bounce from subject to subject, so why should my blog be any different?  This one is for you Meridith.

1)  Do you alter recipes when you cook?  Even when I try to follow a recipe, I end up not following it – especially when I try to follow it.   I think it has something to do with rules – I don’t follow those either.  I tend to view both as being meant for other people and merely suggestions for someone like myself.

2) Let’s have it: first kiss. How’d that happen?  My first kiss?  Awkward.  My first kiss with Pat?  It was so nice we had another and nineteen & a half years later, that’s all I’m going to say about that.

3) What do you do with bad photos?  Depends how bad they are.  Of me?  Destroy them of course.  Here in the digital age, it’s nice to be able to have only a camera memory card full of good photos or at least interesting ones.

4) Hitchhiking. For or against?  Generally and as the mother of a girl, against.  Unless of course you’re in New Orleans and it’s Mardi Gras and you hop a ride in the back of a pick up with your pals. Which means I guess I’m for it in group party settings.

5) Why do you live where you live?  Charlottesville?  Because Pat was offered a job here and we thought we’d give it a try.  It stuck.  This house?  Because the first time I walked in, I knew I was home.  It had everything we wanted in a house – the non-negotiable items like a dishwasher and a gas stove to the things we’d love to have but weren’t a deal breaker, like a fireplace and hardwood floors to the dream list – a creek in the back yard and a great big old dogwood in the front yard.  It was only later we realized we lived in the best neighborhood around.  We’re dug in as they say, but after being here for 14 years, packing this up is going to be a bitch.

6) Best compliment you’ve ever received?  Edie had to write an essay about someone she cared about last year in school.  She chose me.  She called me successful.

Considering I don’t really have a typical career because I’ve put being a mom first before anything else, the fact that she thinks I’m successful?  Best. Compliment. Ever.

7) Go on and pick a new name. Now tell us what it is.  Did I ever tell you about the time I attended an event with my Aunt Jenny that required preregistration, but having decided to go that day I was not preregistered?  She called around, found out which business associate wasn’t going to be attending and I signed in as that woman.  I was handed her name tag, which I wore, since everyone else was wearing one.  At one point I was wandering around by myself when I noticed a gentleman giving me the eye.  He was staring at my name tag.  He finally approached me and told me that he knew the real ‘me’ and I was not her – what was the deal?  I quietly told him I was undercover for an investigation and I’d appreciate him not blowing my cover, national security and all that jazz and walked away.

Turns out I was a good 15 years younger, half a foot taller, a few pounds lighter and an entirely different race than the real ‘me’.

Since the name belongs to a real person, I’m not listing it here.  I’d hate to blow my own cover.

I do sometimes answer to Betsy though – which is the name of another blond haired, blue eyed girl I grew up with.  It’s close enough to Becky and my own mother would sometimes call me that.   (Edie’s got a friend that resembles her – from the back, both the girl’s mother & myself have confused them.  I may have started yelling at the back of  the girl one day that I thought was mine for ignoring her mother speaking to her only to have her turn around and discover, Oops!  Nevermind. So it happens…)

8) What do you say when someone is grieving?  For years after my father passed away, I would cringe when people would give me the usual “I’m so sorry for your loss.”  Why were they apologizing?  Were they responsible? Most of them didn’t even know him -it just seemed so hollow, so unauthentic.    I’ve sort of mellowed out as I’ve gotten older, but I still detest the standard phrases we say to people who are grieving.  So I tend to say that – that I don’t like the standard phrases, but I want to reach out and let them know they are in my thoughts.

Grief is one of those things we all go through, but I don’t think you truly comprehend it until you are there.  It doesn’t have an expiration date either – at any time it can sneak in and smack you up the backside of the head when you least expect it.  It affects all of us differently, which is probably why these polite standards have become, well, standard.  But that doesn’t mean I have to like them or use them.

9) Where do you write?  On the computer, in the middle of the living room.  Usually while something is cooking on the stove and half the kids in the neighborhood are tramping in & out of my house, especially if there’s a deadline involved.  I think the word on the street is that deadline = party at our house.

10) Do you tell people you blog? What about family?  My blog has it’s own Facebook page – and yes, there are family members who read it on a regular basis.

11) The last thing you do before sleep is… Read, even if it’s only a few lines from my current book.  Unless of course we’re watching TV past 9 pm, in which case I hand the remote to Pat.

In the spirit of the game, I suppose I should come up with 11 questions for some of my blog friends that I think my other blog friends should meet, that are optional, but at the very least, I think you all should introduce yourselves because I like you and I think you’d like you too.

First up.  A few blogs I think you should all visit on a regular basis,

The Water Witch’s Daughter

The Goddess of Gumbo

Wishing Heart

Everything but the kitchen sink

Fatuous Observations

Bad at being Mom

Now, questions to be answered, or not.

1.  The one book you read over and over again.

2.  Meal planner or just open the fridge and see what you have and throw it together kind of cook?

3.  Favorite curse word.

4.  Which is the better album – Dark Side of the Moon or The Wall?

5.  In the movie of your life, who would play you?

6.  Best decision you ever made?

7.  What’s your guilty pleasure?

8.  How did you meet your significant other?

9.  Coffee, tea or soda in the morning?

10. Favorite noodle type.

11.  Why did you start blogging to begin with?