April over at Desperate Writer tagged me ages ago for this meme.
Sorry it’s taken me so long to get around to doing it, April.
Anyway, here it is –
Seven things you might not know about me:
1. I would like to drive all the way around the USA in this car
Aaaah, Dodge Viper, when will you be mine?
2. I like to listen to early blues guitarists for their simplicity and purity of sound. My favourite by far is the legendary Son House.
3. My favourite singer of all time is Gladys Knight. I don’t have a will but everyone I know is aware that I want some Gladys played at my funeral, preferably the rare acoustic version of Midnight Train to Georgia I found in a record shop in London.
4. When I was a teenager I used to shoplift on a regular basis. I did it because my father was so controlling. I think I wanted to get caught so he would be embarrassed. I never did get caught, oddly enough, probably because I looked like such a goody goody. The largest item I ever stole was a pair of two hundred dollar boots. I just put them on and walked nonchalantly out of the shop. I sometimes find this maverick part of my character to be alarming.
5. I have an irrational fear of ventriloquist dummies. One of my Irish Aunts worked in the theatre and kept a VD in a suitcase under her bed. Its manic fixed expression and little wooden hands freaked me out straight away. One night I stayed over at her place and had to sleep in her bed. I am sure I heard it shuffling around under the bed in the middle of the night.
6. I can’t sew. I can manage buttons but they’re usually all lop-sided. I was the only girl in my school to be asked to leave needlework class due to incompetence. I think that’s why I am obsessed with Project Runway. Those people are my heroes.
7. I saved a little boy’s life once. In a restaurant. He was choking on a chicken bone. His mother started to scream and shake him. I did the Heimlich on him. The chicken bone flew across the room with the force of an arrow. The little boy threw up on my shoes. I was thankful I didn’t crack one of his ribs.
So there you have it. Seven little known pieces of trivia about me. It was fun coming up with them.
Please feel free to carry out this meme if you would like to. I enjoyed it!
Selma In The City 
That’s a wonderful thing you did on #7.
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I certainly feel like I know you better after this one. Then again, I feel like I know you better the more I read. Odd, isn’t it? We haven’t ever met yet I feel like we have…
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1: Not my favourite car. But I can appreciate it.
2/3: Son House and many others from that era… my favourite music.
4: I shop lifted twice and got caught on the second attempt. It goes to court next week. (Nah just kidding)
5/6: You may recall my irrational fear… it ties in with number six, no hang on… it’s not an irrational fear to be afraid of buttons! They are a real threat.
7: Just be thankful you didn’t have your $200 boots on at the time.
I remember asking you top marry me after another of these lists some time ago… but this settles it Selma… with number 5, you’re too weird for even me.
🙂
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Selma,
2 I like to listen to early blues guitarists for their simplicity and purity of sound…
Me too! I dig Son House, I’m also partial to Elmore James, Blind Willie McTell, Johnny Shines, Reverend Gary Davis, Memphis Minnie, Muddy Waters, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Blind Willie Johnson, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Furry Lewis, Skip James, Blind Blake, Willie Walker, Frank Stokes, Mississippi John Hurt, Albert King, Tampa Red, Lonnie Johnson, Buddy Moss….
5. I have an irrational fear of ventriloquist dummies.
There’s nothing irrational about autonomatonophobia. The only thing creepier than a ventriloquist dummy would be a ventriloquist dummy made up like a clown, riding a merry-go-round. One of the most disturbing Twilight Zones that I saw as a boy was called “The Dummy” about a VD who comes to life…he had a real spine-chilling laugh, mocking and psychopathic- ultra creepy.
7. I saved a little boy’s life once. In a restaurant…. The little boy threw up on my shoes….
Hooray for you, life saver. If you were ever going to use this event as a basis for fiction,
I’d have the little boy throwing up on the boots you shoplifted in 4 – for a touch of poetic irony.
Thanks for letting us know a little more about you.
DavidM
My comment for “I had a little robin” seems to have disappeared. Let me say here that I enjoyed reading it. It was a great, well-written read.
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Shoplifting? I never would have guessed. So when you drive around the US in that car, can you pick me up just outside of Chicago? We could listen to Gladys Knight and the blues.
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Forget everything else, after your shoplifting revelation, lets go Vivienne Westwood shopping!
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JASON – I was stressed out but no one was doing anything. I had just done a First Aid course, so I just plunged in. I shook for about an hour afterwards. I don’t know how paramedics and emergency doctors do it on a daily basis. They must have nerves of steel.
RICHARD – I feel that way about so many of the bloggers I read, including you. It is odd but I feel in some ways that getting to know someone through their writing means getting to the true essence of the person. I think it’s a good thing!
BEAR – one way to get us both bordering on the brink of mania would be to present us with a ventriloquist dummy wearing a jacket with enormous buttons. I am quivering at the thought. Oh, so another marriage proposal bites the dust, eh? *sigh*
DAVID – your taste in music mirrors my own. Love, love, love your choices. I saw that Twilight Zone episode. My throat has actually gone dry thinking about it. The VD as a clown on a merry-go-round? I think that would mean the apocalypse was nigh!
What a great idea for a story. I have to write it, don’t I?
I will find out what happened to your comment but thankyou!
LINDA – you are on! And we can shoplift at all the best stores. *only joking*
KATE – I’m there. Just call me Lightfingers McGee.
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As you know, we are “right here” on those ventriloquist dummies. They are so damned spooky. Also? I used to shoplift a lot as a teenager too for almost the exact same reason (but it was my Mom).
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Oh my gosh, I so get the ventriloquist dummy fear. Those things are beyond creepy!! I have a similar fear of dolls. Not the Barbie type, the old antique porcelain dolls – ugh! I wouldn’t be able to sleep if one of those things was within three rooms of me. …and then, of course, there are clowns. We won’t even go there ’cause I’d like to be able to sleep tonight. Did you ever read Stephen King’s It?
I was always too chicken to shoplift. Too much hell to pay when I got home if I had been caught. I did perfect the art of the fib when I was a child, though. I had a very vivid imagination. 🙂
I love that you like Gladys Knight. That is just so cool to me.
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Wow….you saved someone’s life? THAT IS AWESOME.
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I was going to say about wearing the boots for #7, but I was beaten to it 🙂
If we were all judged by our behaviour as kids, we’d all be damned. And I guess #7 wipes it all out anyway.
My wife is spooked by ventriloquist’s dummies, too. There’s been some marvellous films featuring them.
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Wow, that’s quite a list Selma! Love the car.
Ahhhem….shoplifting, a rite of passage when/where I went to high school. NOT a good one but it was a status thing, right? Also, I had a controlling father too, maybe that was part of it.
I’m really impressed re: saving that boy’s life. I know the drill on how this is done but thankfully have never had to use it.
Hugs, G 🙂
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HILLY – I do hate those horrible little wooden guys. Uuugghh. I’ve met a couple of people recently who confessed to shoplifting as teenagers due to a controlling parent. I think we were rebels. Or maybe the trauma from seeing the dummies made us do it!
EPIPHANY – those porcelain dolls give me the shivers too. I have read ‘It’, one of King’s best. The clown in that would put anyone off. I think most kids fib now and then. My sister was the worst. Even when caught red-handed she would say she hadn’t done it. I just love Gladys. She warms my heart!
MELEAH – I still can’t believe I did it. I was so scared. But I often think :’What if I’d done nothing and that boy had choked to death?’ I’d never be able to forgive myself.
ANTHONY – so true. Most of us got up to something dodgy as kids. Your wife is spooked too? It’s interesting how many people are freaked out by them. You really should do a post about it. I’d love to read it!
GERALDINE – You too? It must have been a teenage rebellion thing. You would be surprised with the Heimlich. It just sort of happens. Afterwards I felt an overwhelming sense of relief that it had worked.
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Ventriloquist dummies…**shudder**
How wonderful that you saved that boy!
Whan you get that iper and come over, be sure to come to Texas and cruise with me and my PT!
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DESPERATE WRITER – you are on. I would love to cruise through Texas with you. I’d have to get some bona fide cowboy gear to celebrate. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if it actually happened one day?
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I have unwittingly shoplifted a few times. How so you ask? I am so forgetful when I go shopping that I truly have forgotten I am still carrying around items I haven’t paid for as I leave the store. I swear to God it’s true. I went waltzing out of a Venture store once with a huge print under my arm. I was so brazen about it that obviously everyone thought it must be paid for. I didn’t realise myself until I was almost at the car.
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GYPSY – my goodness. You are going to get frisked by a young security guard at this rate. LOL. That kind of thing is easy to do, though. My friend, Jules, does it all the time. She is always doing a million things at once!
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