Childhood Meme, gakked from elsaf

1. What was the first car your family had?
The first one I remember was a Pinto (red?). I think. The folks also had the 1965 Ford Mustang that had been mother’s when she was a teenager. They still have it, actually.

2. What was the name of your first pet and why?
Had a hermit crab when I was in 4th grade and I’ve no idea what its name was. Didn’t have pets as a kid cuz dad’s allergic. (I have Leo, my cat, now. Before Leo was Squeaky the hamster.)

3. What did you want to be when you grew up?
A teacher. Didn’t know what subject, just knew I wanted to teach. (Dad was a teacher and after school we’d wait around in his room before he’d drive us home in the Mustang. So I’d write on the chalkboard and try to teach my sister, 4 years my junior, all the stuff I learned that day. Poor kid!)

4. What was the name of your elementary school?
Newton Elementary. Which is in the same building as Newton High School. Which is where I teach now. 🙂

5. Who was your first best friend?
Erik Piper. We were a dangerous combination. So much so that it was in our school records to never be in the same elementary class as the other. We, of course, didn’t know this. So near the end of summer when we’d find out who our next teacher was, we’d go “So who’d you get?” “I got Miss So&So” “Awww, I got Mrs Whatsit!” I told Erik about this school record note about 10 years after we graduated HS. He immediately rushed into the other room (where my dad was) and said “Is that true, Mr Short?!?” They knew we were an explosive combo, btw, through our Sunday school classes. We were both very creative and intelligent (Erik much moreso than me) and very difficult to control. We had fun. 🙂

6. Are you still friends today, and if not, what happened?
Still friends, but out of touch. He’s in the Czech Republic with his wife and (at the time I last communicated with him) one daughter (might be more now).

7. What was your favorite board game?
Stratego. Probably still is. (Remember when we tried to play that online, judiang?)

8. Did you play house or other make believe games?
Yup. House. School. Superheroes (Erik & I had a gazillion each.) Out back where the playground used to be (it’s the carpark now) was a huge rock that Erik and I dubbed “Brainstorm Rock” where we’d concoct our various superhero schemes before walking around the playground N number of times or swinging for the duration of recess.

9. Were you a Dungeons and Dragons geek?
Nope. I liked the cartoon, though. 🙂

10. Did you sleep with stuffed animals as a kid?
Yup. Teeny Tiny Teddy mostly.

11. Do you still sleep with stuffed animals?
Yup. Still Teeny. But at least I don’t take him with me on trips anymore. elsaf & judiang can tell you about the trips I’ve been on with Teeny. He’s a week older than me, however, and the long trips aren’t good for him anymore. So he keeps an eye on Leo while I’m on trips.

12. Who was the first person you looked up to when you were younger?
I looked up to most people when I was small. Heh heh. I had several heroes. Dad. Jean Stapleton. Elizabeth in the Tomorrow People. The Spears, Jim & Helen, from the UMC. etc.

13. Who was your favorite relative?
Gramma Anderson – we bonded during my stint with chicken pox. She was my buddy.

14. Were you short or tall in elementary school?
Tall. Damn junior high when I stopped growing and the boys started growing!

15. Were you teased in school?
Oh god, yes.

16. What was the name of your favorite teacher?
Mrs. Penkal, who was my 3rd grade reading teacher when I was in 2nd grade (Erik was taking 6th grade reading then – I said he was smart!) and later my English teacher during 5th grade. She’s the reason I started writing. She encouraged my love of poetry and got me writing it.

17. What was the name of your least favorite teacher?
I didn’t have one in elementary. I loved all of my teachers (which is good, cuz I work with a number of them now!) There was the asshole who was in charge of the library when I was in junior high. He’s the reason I always worked for dad as a lab aide.

18. What was your best subject in school?
English, science, math.

19. What was your worst subject in school?
Gym.

20. Did you do well in Physical Education?
Nope. Know that kid they always pick last? That was me!

21. Were you clumsy when you were younger?
Not so clumsy as ornery.

22. Who was your favorite band as a kid?
The Beatles and the Monkees.

23. What was your favorite movie as a kid?
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (and still is).

24. Did your parents read to you?
Yes. Bath night was an especially great night for book reading.

25. Did you have a favorite book?
Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator (and still is).

26. What was your favorite restaurant as a kid?
Burger Chef (and Jeff!). Taco Bell, believe it or not, was considered a special treat. 🙂

27. What TV or movie star did you have a crush on?
Eric Idle, but that didn’t happen until I was 11 or so. It lasted a long time – I still have a crush on him. 🙂

28. Do you now wonder what you were thinking?
Nope – like I said, I still have it. 🙂

29. Who was your first crush in school?
I’m no so sure I had one. Wasn’t much for romance.

30. As a child, what kind of car did you want when you grew up?
Didn’t. Didn’t want a car, didn’t want to drive.

31. Did your parents spank you?
Yup. Dad used the Wooden Spoon. It made a great “pop” sound and probably sounded worse than it hurt.

32. Did your parents fight a lot when you were a kid?
Nope.

33. Did your parents get divorced or stay married?
Stayed married.

34. If they got divorced, how old were you when it happened?
N/A

35. Did you ever run away from home?
Nope, but Amy (my sister) did once.

36. How old were you when/if you first got glasses?
The summer between 5th and 6th grade, I think. Nobody noticed!

37. Did you need braces or a retainer?
Nope. My dentist took my father aside after one dental appointment and said “When your daughter turns 16, buy her a car. She’s just saved you a fortune in dental work.” He didn’t get me the car. If only he’d paid for my wisdom teeth removal… 😉

38. If you’re male, how old were you when you had your first wet dream?
N/A

39. Both sexes when did you start shaving?
LOL – funny story here. I hated shaving my legs, but that wasn’t a problem, I hated wearing shorts. But one summer we were all on vacation and it was HOT. I didn’t have any shorts, so we turned one of my pairs of jeans into shorts. But my sister REFUSED to go out in public with me having my hairy legs. (Fish-belly white legs with dark hairs is VERY obvious.) We didn’t have any shaving cream in the hotel room, so Amy used bath gel or something, had me stand on the toilet seat, and shaved my legs for me.

40. Girls when did you start wearing a bra?
Um, 4th grade… And I remember being proud! Grief, ain’t so proud now – more bent over. 😉

41. What was your first kiss like?
Wasn’t a kid when it happened. (I was 25.)

42. What did you do on your first date?
Also not a childhood thing.

43. How old were you when you first drank?
We used to have wine at Thanksgiving. I hated it then and still not terribly fond of wine now. (Though the Turning Leaf Riesling, 2004 Reserve, we had last night was pretty good.)

44. Where was your first house?
Next door to the one I live in now. I moved in next door to the parental units. 🙂

Phew! All that remembering sure took it out of me!

I didn’t get home until 4:30pm, but when I did arrive, there was a clear winner in the Jack-O’-Lantern Design Contest. The very cute “Yawn!” won – yay! Good work, dark_pheonix! In second place was the also cute “Alien” by capriuni. Thanks to both of you for your wonderful contributions. I should be set for the next 13 years’ Halloweens. 🙂

So the next stage was to actually carve the design into my pumpkin. I did my best to replicate dark_pheonix‘s design. And I decided to do a step-by-step photo tutorial on carving a pumpkin. I have included this in my LiveJournal gallery. If you click here, you can see the whole 20 step process. 🙂

But I know what you REALLY want to see. You want to see the final result.

Jack at the front door, greeting the Trick-Or-Treaters.

Jack in the dark!

I wound up having 73 Trick-Or-Treaters. A little less than last year. And I had more candy than last year – so I guess the juniors and seniors get candy tomorrow. 🙂 The folks were over at Granny’s giving out candy and they ran out. After 146 kids came to trick-or-treat. Wow, what a difference living on a main drag makes!

My costume this year for Dress Up for UNICEF (a yearly tradition at the high school) was very simple. I borrowed dad’s trench coat, wore my khaki jeans, brown shoes, sunglasses, and fedora. I also had a newspaper with 2 eye holes cut out, and brought my itty bitty digital camera with me. Yup, I was a private dick eye. What I need to do next year is get a pinstripe suit and violin case, wear my sister’s black fedora, and go as a Chicago Mobster. 🙂

So, another successful Beggar’s Night. I hope those of you who actually have beggar’s night on the same night as Halloween (wow! what a concept!) I hope that you have as much fun as I have. And remember, if you have half as much fun as me, then I’ve had twice as much fun as you. 🙂

I’m sure folks are busy designing their lovely Jack-O’-Lanterns for me (heh), but I thought I should warn everyone there’s less than 24 hours to go. Tomorrow morning I’ll be posting the entries for voting. dark_pheonix has designed some real fun ones, so there will definitely be something to vote on. Hope to see some more designs as well.

Good luck in your designing and may the best pumpkin win! 😉

Oddly enough, the worst day of my recovery so far was yesterday. Yesterday morning I took my last Vicodin, but I’m not sure that it was working anymore for me anyhoo. So I switched to Ibuprofen (with Acetaminophen on the off hours if the pain is still there) when I take my Amoxicillin. Still, I had many moments of pain – like having overly sensitive teeth. I even pondered going home from school early. I ended up not doing that, but my afternoon was not as productive as it could have been.

Today, the pain wasn’t as much, which is nice. However, there was some time when one of my sutures came unraveled enough to get caught between my back molars. Very annoying. Either it’s finally broken off or dissolved, but the annoying thread is finally gone.

In the non-teeth front, my physics students had their egg drop contest today. They came up with some clever platforms upon which to drop naked eggs. There were two in particular which had some great physics in their design. All but 3 groups managed to survive the drop from the 3rd floor, which is very good. (We drop from 1 meter, second floor, and third floor. They get full points for the egg surviving each drop.) The winner of the contest had a platform that was only 16cm off of the ground. Pretty impressive!

The egg drop contest is the first of four engineering projects that my students do during the course of the school year. Next up (probably next week) is the Comeback Cans. Then we have the two bigger projects, both worth test grades. The catapult contest and the toothpick bridge contest.

What I’d like to do some year is create a few more engineering projects for later in the school year. After the toothpick bridges, we’re out of mechanics (it’s in the unit with scaling) so any further engineering projects would need to be wave-based.

BTW, the prize for this first contest was a pair of Sonic Sound Sizzlers (yeah, a bit repetitive for that title). It’s a pair of strong magnets in oblong shapes that, when thrown so they connect in the air, will make a fun sizzling sound. I love it when Walmart has cheap-o physics toys on sale!

Anyhoo. here’s hoping yesterday was the worst of it and everything is downhill from now on. I miss having crunchy foods! (I ate some peanut butter today because I’ve missed nuts.)

I’ve been doing very well in the wisdom tooth extraction recovery. Yesterday, in fact, I went shopping with the parental units! I bought a pair of new shoes (Land’s End from Sears) and pre-ordered City of Villains. judiang and I have been playing the beta of CoV and have been enjoying our bad selves. 🙂 So I decided, what the hell… Alas, I can’t even blame being on Vicodin for the purchase because it was almost time to retake the medication. 🙂

So last night, I even ate real food. Sort of. We stopped at Bob Evans for supper and I ordered chicken noodles and mashed taters. I asked the waitress if she could pick out the chicken and stick with mostly noodles & broth. She was very kind and did a good job at that. It was nice to eat something other than Slim Fast shakes. I ate so slow that even dad was done before me. And then for dessert, I got a chocolate fudge sundae. That was mighty fine ice cream! Mom and dad had a few bites too. But the cool ice cream on the gums was a pleasure. Of course, I had to top that lovely meal off by doing my warm salt water rinse in the bathroom. Bleh.

After my exciting day yesterday (heh – well, that shopping experience and a walk to the post office were my only adventurous events of the day – I watched more DVDs the rest of the time) I took it real easy today. I watched The Revenger’s Tragedy (the sixth of my six DVD rental) and listened to my new Doctor Who audios. And watched The Cat Came Back, a DVD I’ve had but hadn’t yet watched. I still have part 4 of LIVE 34, the latest Doc7 audio from Big Fish, to finish. And I’ll probably watch Iron Chef America. But I’m done for the day as far as activity is concerned. 🙂

Oh, supper tonight was Mrs. Grass’s noodle soup with lots of soda crackers soaked in it. I also had two bananas during the course of the day, and lunch saw me added some grits to the diet. (And the grits inspired me to my first bout of flossing since surgery.) OK, I think I’m starting to make less sense. Amazing, for all the rest I had today, I’m awfully sleepy. Since I’m going to work tomorrow, I’ll head to bed early. Hopefully I can get through the day OK tomorrow. I think I will.

Thanks to all for their kind & supporting comments on my last post re: wisdom teeth extraction.

The teeth are out. The gauze is being replaced every 15 minutes (or whenever I wake up). The Vicodin & Amoxacillin were taken at 3pm. I have a dull throb of pain, but nothing horrible. And I’ve slept through two movies so far. 🙂

Alfie, with Jude Law, I only rented for the eye candy. I missed most of the beginning but saw the end. Mmmmm, Jude Law. That’s all I wanted from that flick.

Team America, World Police. Ah, if only I’d been asleep during the big vomit scene. Still, the bits I saw were silly, violent, and fun.

I’ll go put on another flick & drift in and out of sleep again. They’re helping me sleep, which is good. And if I find any that I think I’d like to see again, well I have ’em until Tuesday!

Tomorrow (or rather, later this morning) I shall be knocked out for the first time in my life. Well, there was the time I slipped & fell on the ice & hit my head – I think I was unconscious for a few seconds. But, no, I’m talking about having a general anesthetic. Yes, tomorrow is my wisdom teeth surgery.

So at 9am EDT October 14th, I shall be arriving at Dr. Kim’s office in Troy and they’ll put me under & pull out the top two teeth and saw thru the bottom two & pull them out in two pieces each. Bleh. Tonight, I ate my last meal before 7pm and I am not allowed anything to drink now that it’s after midnight. I bought some slim fast drink mixes, made ice, and have a fresh gallon of milk, so I’m going for the sippable suppers for the rest of the weekend. (I also have pudding & Jell-o for variety. The cashews will have to wait!)

I picked up 6 DVDs at the rental place for watching (or sleeping through) this weekend. I miss the days of $.99 DVDs at the local Hollywood Video. Rather than costing me $6, they cost me $24. This, and the fact that I still haven’t seen all of the DVDs that I own, is the reason I don’t usually rent DVDs.

Since I don’t actually think in the morning, I also purchased some masking tape (purple, of course) so that I can tape my fridge shut & tape my faucets shut too. This will remind me not to drink anything. Providing Leo doesn’t remove the tape, I’ll remember in the morning not to drink anything.

So, anyhoo, if you can think of poor (scared) Trina in the morning, do so. I do good at avoiding the whole surgery thing, but every once in awhile, it happens. Bleh.

Still, I shall leave you all with one of my favorite sketches from Laugh In. (From memory – no idea if the words are perfectly correct.)

A woman is talking with a doctor. “I’m afraid this is difficult for me to say…” he tells her.

“It’s OK, I can take it, Doc.”

“I’m going to have to perform emergery surgery. Um, emergency surgency. I’m going to have to perform emergency surgery. See, I told you it was hard for me to say…”

I’m a slave to pattern, so I have to have a post tonight. But I don’t have anything to write about. So…. Maybe I’ll have something to write on the 14th.

Oh, I suppose I can wish Granny a happy 85th birthday for tomorrow. Except that I already wished it yesterday at her birthday party. And she doesn’t read my journal, anyhoo. (I still haven’t gotten her a birthday gift. Suppose I can find a book for her – hoping she hasn’t already read it. 🙂