thoughtful6. I love snakes and spiders, have no fear of sharks, and tend to giggle hysterically when I'm on a plane and it hits a patch of turbulence that makes it feel like we're going to fall out of the sky. I am, however, morbidly terrified of pudding. This translates into a fear of any type of slug that isn't so ludicrously colored as to seem like a special effect.
5. I will not go into brackish water, because of the potential for leeches. Even if I am assured that there are no leeches in the entire country, I will not go into brackish water, because of the potential for leeches. Leeches are just not okay. Thank you, Stand By Me. In an attempt to conquer my fear, I kept a jar of leeches in my kitchen for a whole year. Those leeches were okay, because they were behind glass.
4. My collection of My Little Ponies is epic and vast, and contains almost all of the larger buildings from the original 1980s run of the toy line. Yes, including the Paradise Estate, which is roughly the size of a large card table. In that misty, far-off future where I actually have an office of my very own, it's going to wind up evenly divided between research material and plastic horses. Because that's just how I roll.
3. I grew up really, really, really poor, and I read really, really, really fast. These things combined mean that I grew up a dedicated re-reader, and will read books that I enjoy five, ten, or even twenty times. My count on The Stand is somewhere in the mid-fifties. The weirdest thing about my current bounty of available reading material is the lack of re-reading. I haven't read any of my favorites in over a year, and it's making me twitchy.
2. I have these long, elaborate, lucid dreams that seem entirely real when they're going on, even down to my needing to eat and use the bathroom in my sleep. They always end when someone tells me that I'm dreaming, and while they tend to be very realistic and grounded, they also tend to involve elements of "in a perfect world," like, you know, being published. Part of me spends every day afraid someone's going to tell me I'm dreaming.
1. My childhood idols were Vincent Price, Marilyn Munster, and Doctor Who. Considering that, and considering the way my life has turned out, I don't think I'm doing so bad. And I think they'd be proud of me.
February 24 2011, 00:56:14 UTC 6 years ago
After about 20 minutes I was ready to hike back up and I went to get my shoes, looked down, and discovered it. There. Attached to my big toe. Hanging out all cool as you please.
A leech.
I nearly had a panic attack. I know you were not supposed to pull - their teethy things might get stuck in my toe! But I was a mile of rough farmland from any sort of civilization. I couldn't get anything with which to burn the sucker off (and was more than a little afraid of scorching my toe even if I could have)! I couldn't walk home barefoot and leeched!
I still don't know how or why, but after another 20 minutes of flailing the thing just let go. Maybe it had drunk its fill of my blood. Maybe it got tired of my swinging my foot through the water like a madman.
All I know is that I have never waded in the creek since.
February 24 2011, 15:50:02 UTC 6 years ago
Ngh.
That is all.