100th Post!

Wearing red lipstick (see #5)

This humble little blog has reached its 100th post!  I understand that it's a sort of blogging tradition to share 100 facts about oneself on this occasion.  So I've accrued some random tidbits about me, myself and I.  I just hope it doesn't bore everyone to tears.  Right, here we go...

1. Today is my birthday! One more year before the dreaded 3-0.  I was born exactly half a century after Sylvia Plath, which I think is pretty awesome.
2. I have to pinch myself sometimes when I think about how spectacular my friends and family members are.  How did I get so lucky?! (By the way, I don't literally pinch myself.  It's just a metaphor.  I like metaphors.)
3. I am prone to tangents (see #2).  Sometimes others poke fun at me for it, but I like to believe this is due to the fact that I'm always thinking (see #61).
4. I can't stay away from sugary treats.  Cake is a favourite, so I constantly rephrase the infamous line of Marie Antoinette propaganda to 'Then let me eat cake!'  And then I eat cake...
5. I adore the color red; can't stay away from it.
6. I have lived in England on and off for three years, but in all that time, I never once visited Scotland, Wales or Ireland despite the best of intentions
7. I'm determined to change that the next time I cross the pond, starting with Edinburgh.
8. I have four sisters and one brother.  Some of these are half-siblings by blood, full-siblings in terms of love.
9. I am the oldest.  Hello baby-sitting duty!
10. Therefore, I can't quite understand those people who are scared of babies.  Seriously, it's just a baby. 
11. London is the best city in the world.  No question.
12. I can quote entire scenes from movies I haven't seen in years, thus provoking some spontaneous one-woman shows.
13. As I ease into my 'old age' this 'gift' is beginning to fade. It now requires 3-5 viewings for me to memorize full passages of dialogue.
14. This is a tragedy for me, but a blessing to those around me.
15. My first job was as a market research associate; aka, I endured the cruel hell that is conducting over-the-phone surveys.  Never again.
16. Every time I live in England, I move further North.  I worry that if I continue this trend I will eventually end up at the North Pole.  
17. I love trees.  They make any setting more beautiful.

Taken at the grounds of Harewood House

18. Pride and Prejudice is the first classic I ever read.  It was my gateway to the wonderful world of nineteenth-century literature. 
19. I want to visit every English estate that has starred as Pemberley in a P&P adaptation.
20. I want to get a degree in the History of Art.  Just because.
21. I adore Pre-Raphaelite art. Millais' Ophelia and Waterhouse's The Lady of Shallott are among my favourite pieces.
22. I firmly believe a life without spicy food is not a life worth living.
23. I can't watch The Office (UK version) or Extras without laughing.
24. Extras once made me laugh in my sleep.  For reals.
25. It drives me crazy when people use the word 'good' in a sentence when they should be saying 'well.'
26. Obviously, I'm a bit of a Grammar Nazi.
27. I moved approximately twelve times before the age of eighteen (the moves before age three are a bit fuzzy).
28. I was born in Utah and have also lived in Idaho and Colorado.
29. I'd love to live back East.  I think it's more my style.
30. I'm engaged to Richard Armitage from the BBC adaptation of North and South.  He just doesn't know it yet.

31. It drives me crazy (no pun intended) when people steer vehicles with their knees, especially if it's only so they can employ hand gestures while chatting.  I'm talking about you, Mum!
32. In 13 years of driving, I've managed to avoid a ticket. (Touch wood.)
33. Jane Eyre is the book that I go back to most often -- for the good parts.  You know what I mean.
34. If you don't know what I mean, I would advise you read said novel at once.
35. I am obsessed with all things Victorian.

36. I finally visited Italy in April of this year.  Florence is my favourite Italian city.  I think.  It's so hard to choose.
37. My favourite household chore is vacuuming.  I dream of owning a Dyson.  Literally; I'm not using a metaphor for this time.  
38. My guilty pleasures are bad YA novels and reality television.
39. Chip (or crisps) and salsa is my favourite food.
40. I always crave them when I'm ill.
41. English chips cause me to gain approximately 10 pounds every time I'm over there. 
42. I am terrified of sharks, but I tune in to Shark Week on the Discovery Channel every summer.
43. If I could travel back in time, I would check out Victorian London.
44. But I would do so as a man, like Irene Adler in Arthur Conan Doyle's 'A Scandal in Bohemia.'
45. I love nerds. Seriously, a man instantly becomes more attractive to me if he's reading a (good) book and/or wearing glasses.
46. Misogyny, an inability to make me laugh and smoking, on the other hand, are major turn-offs.  As are non-readers -- I just can't do it.  Is this why I'm perpetually single?
47. My Master's degree is in Victorian Literature (see #35)..
48. I also adore children's lit and novels from the late eighteenth century.
49. Beauty and the Beast is my favourite Disney film.  I know a lot of men like Gaston.
50. I maintain this film has one of the romantic moments in screen history.  He gives her a library.  A library.  I'm practically swooning as I type.
51. I've made a lot of jokes about swooning ever since reading Ann Radcliffe's The Romance of the Forest earlier this year.
52. I am an absolute baby when watching horror films.
53. So I just avoid them altogether.
54. Unless they're set in the Victorian period (see #35).
55. I'm a proud feminist.  Gender rights for all!
56. I can't wait to explore more of Europe.  Vienna and Prague are at the top of my list. 
57. I adore Flight of the Conchords and sing their songs at random moments.
58. Elizabeth Gaskell is a favourite author, but I've only discovered her in the past few years.
59. I'm a night owl who can't seem to convert to early birdism despite my best efforts.  I'm always a zombie in the morning and often do ridiculous things in my sleepy state -- like look for milk in the cupboard for a full minute before realizing why that isn't leading to the desired result.
60. I get very annoyed by pretentious people.
61. I can be a pretentious person. 
62. I don't keep up-to-date with the music scene, but I enjoy indie rock.
63. Chopin's Etude in E is one of my favourite piano pieces.
64. I am always very curious and eager to learn about new subjects.
65. Except mathematics.  Gross.
66. I have so many rules for borrowers of my books to follow that people generally don't bother.
67. But I use any excuse to buy books for others, which I hope makes up for my OCD book behavior.
68. One of my favourite quotes is from Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey: 'The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.'
69. I love, how they went crazy with commas, in the nineteenth century, and often have to restrain myself, from following suit,,,
70. I have seen every episode of Sex and the City numerous times.  I'm a Miranda.
71. Modern Family is my current tv fave. 
72. I obsessively sanitize surfaces in the winter to avoid illness. It never works.  I still come down with the flu.
73. I enjoy yoga but very rarely practice. 
74. I'm dying to visit India where I hope to ride an elephant.
75. I'm kidding about the elephant.  Kind of.
76. I adore dogs, especially my terrier Percy.
77. He is named after The Scarlet Pimpernel, a favourite from my teenage years.

78. I don't understand why people don't like dogs, even though I went through a lengthy period where I was indifferent to them.
79. Little Women was the first literary adaptation for which I went absolutely crazy.
80. Amelie is my favourite foreign film.
81. I used to want to live in France. Then I saw the error of my ways. : )
82. High modernism is my literary phobia.  I avoid it at all costs, because I feel like the biggest idiot on the planet when attempting to interpret it. 
83. I dream of having a job that pays me to read and/or travel.
84. Bach's Prelude to Cello Suite One moves me every time I hear it, even if it's the soundtrack to a ridiculous advertisement. Thus, learning to play the cello is on my bucket list.
85. After years of being told I look too pale, I have finally embraced my pallor.
86. I rarely leave the house without sunscreen, because I'm slightly heliophobic. Thus I adore the rainy English weather.
87. I saw JK Rowling across Leicester Square when scoping out The Prisoner of Azkaban premiere.  I think this is far more exciting than conversing with the vast majority of celebrities.
88. It's one of the supreme disappointments of my life that I never attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry -- pretty sure I would have been a Ravenclaw.  
89. One of my pet peeves is Microsoft Word's limited vocabulary.  Transgressive is a word!  I tell you, it is!
90. Bad 80s movies (like Dirty Dancing, Sixteen Candles and Troop Beverly Hills) take me back to my childhood.  Love them. 
91. I can't get enough of West End theatre when I'm in London. 
92. It's now difficult for me to stomach community theatre (see #61).
93. The Sound of Music is my mom's favourite movie, therefore it's a childhood favourite for me.
94. I used to enact scenes from the film.  I played the first six Von Trapp children.  My sister Deb played Gretl. 
95. So I suppose it's no surprise I was a drama geek in high school. 
96. I hated high school and am very suspicious of anyone who says it was the best time of her life. 
97. I love(d) university.  I could go to university forever. 
98. Favourite contemporary films include Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and 500 Days of Summer.
99. Christmas is my favourite holiday, and it's entirely possible that I've already begun holiday cheer preparations by researching Christmas music on iTunes.  Don't worry, I haven't actually downloaded anything.  Yet.
100. I would be very surprised if a single person has made it through this list.