Five things you may or may not know about me.

5. I also like country music - but only female singers. I know the words to more country music from the 80s and the 90s then I care to admit.

4. It is commonly known that I loathe veggies. They are bitter to me in a way that screams 'poison' to my tastebuds, especially the ones that are supposed to be sweet. However, due to my father being out of work for much of childhood, and us subsisting on my mother's waitressing, we had a truck garden the likes of which I have not seen in suburbia. Our yard was huge - and the garden took up a goodly portion. This meant I spent summers stealing produce from the truck garden. Turns out I do like some veggies, but they have to be seriously fresh picked and raw. Like, in a "I picked this a minute ago and now I am nomming sort of way. String beans will never touch my lips 'cause they are gross, except when I just snagged one from the vine and it's still sun warm.

3. I grew up in a haunted house. I don't know what haunted it - still not sure if I believe in ghosts or not - but something evil was in that house, and it scared me. To this day, I have trouble with enclosed dark areas because of that house. I tend to be sceptical believer in wierd things because of this - once you have had all of your toys rearranged and some broken while you are sleeping in a house where no one would do that... its hard to not wonder what's out there.

2. I have just a touch of OCD. Enough that I have a ritual for making certain all my car doors are locked, the proper brakes on are, and the light off before leaving. I can't actually walk more than a block away from the car if I don't do this. If you stop me in a chore, and keep me from doing it the way I was going to do it, I can literally be frozen in place for some time as I try to get back on track and can't or frozen as I forget what I was going, and can't move on.. It's not fun, doing it to me is grounds for a very serious fight.

1. When we were in China, we were of the trying new things - I tried pea candy and thankfully realize that carrot candy was right out - and went to the local market. There were strange fruits there, and well, we liked fruit.

So we picked the strangest and biggest one they had. The staff giggled a lot, and it was very expensive (for China, the exchange rate was our friend and for the first time in my life I felt rich) and they kept shaking their heads no and giggling.

We insisted on purchasing it, and named the fruit 'Jack'. We took it home to the apartment that we were staying at - our host was a work study student who had allowed to stay in someone's apartment while they were on holiday - and put it on the counter for breakfast. We puzzled over Jack for a bit, then decided not to cut it open as we didn't have want to use the frig, and well, it had been out at room temperature at the store.

We awoke to a hideous, vile, smell. A smell that could be declared a chemical weapon. We searched the house, and eventually, noses half dead at the smell, traced the smell back to Jack.

Overnight our cute, huge fruit had become the source of the smell of the Bog of Eternal Stench.

Somehow, we decided to cut Jack open and taste the innards.

And that was our second mistake. It tasted and felt like rotting onion pudding.

When we got home, we were able to match a picture of Jack to a picture on the internet.

We had bought a Durian fruit.

It took us days to air out that apartment.

To this today, we reference Jack. No one gets it, but it always makes us giggle.

We do indeed win at fruit.

I see Durian candy occasionally. I shudder, then attempt to convince people to try.

Durian candy is odd, but not nearly the same.