Way More Than You Ever Wanted To Know About Ironhead…

So my beautiful wife over at Nota Bene posted this and invited the world to steal it and put in on their blogs…I love doing these things because ultimately some lurker will come out of the shadows, put it on their blog and in doing so, I get to meet someone I didn’t know previously. Always a good time. So in the immortal words of my honey…feel free to steal!!

Things You Didn’t Know About Me But Are About To Find Out…aka Have You Ever?? (items I’ve experienced are in bold, complete with my smart-ass comments)…

1. Bought everyone in the bar a drink (this was actually the first thing I did with the very first credit card I ever received when I was in university, and set the stage for the next ten years of debt and frustration)
2. Swam with wild dolphins (this is Top 10 on my life’s To Do list)
3. Climbed a mountain (Boy Scouts…’nuff said)
4. Taken a Ferrari for a test drive (another Top 10 moment)
5. Been inside the Great Pyramid
6. Held a tarantula
7. Taken a candlelit bath with someone (I don’t think we need to go there…needless to say, I married her)
8. Said “I love you” and meant it (yes, but I don’t do it nearly enough with the people I truly love)
9. Hugged a tree
10. Bungee jumped (no, but one day I will in an effort to rid myself of this pesky fear-of-heights thing)
11. Visited Paris (yes, three times in my life…as a matter of fact, Paris is the punchline to a family joke now about my father’s driving/touring habits - “if this is Tuesday and it’s 6am, that must be Paris…wave as you go by, kids”)
12. Watched a lightning storm at sea
13. Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise (I routinely did this for about six years, musicians hate daylight)
14. Seen the Northern Lights
15. Gone to a huge sports game (I’ve been to a couple of Game 7’s in my life)
16. Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa (no, and I’ve had the chance about three times)
17. Grown and eaten your own vegetables (thanks to my folks and the garden at our family home when I was a kid)
18. Touched an iceberg (it’s cheating, but they had an iceberg at the Titanic exhibit in Victoria last year)
19. Slept under the stars (see aforementioned Boy Scouts comment)
20. Changed a baby’s diaper (hee, my niece Carly’s going to hate me for this…)
21. Taken a trip in a hot air balloon
22. Watched a meteor shower (Green Lake in BC, sailing with my dad…one of my fondest memories as a kid)
23. Gotten drunk on champagne
24. Given more than you can afford to charity
25. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope
26. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment (awkward…that’s all I’m going to say…thought I was going to lose my job)
27. Had a food fight
28. Bet on a winning horse
29. Asked out a stranger (how the hell else are you supposed to meet someone?)
30. Had a snowball fight (and in Vancouver, that’s an event)
31. Screamed as loudly as you possibly can (oh yeah…100+ live concerts under my belt, baby)
32. Held a lamb
33. Seen a total eclipse
34. Ridden a roller coaster
35. Hit a home run (I sucked as a ball player - five years, and I only started hitting the ball with some consistency my last year)
36. Danced like a fool and didn’t care who was looking (Coconuts nightclub, September 1993, Pearl Jam’s Evenflow)
37. Adopted an accent for an entire day (I’m blessed with the ability to perfectly mimic my folks, or any member of Monty Python)
38. Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment
39. Had two hard drives for your computer (I’m staring at three right now)
40. Visited all 50 states
41. Taken care of someone who was drunk (heh….yep, and that includes pulling over so they can puke in a ditch)
42. Had amazing friends (had? still have, thank you)
43. Danced with a stranger in a foreign country (1994, I danced through Europe several times)
44. Watched whales (hmmm, I live in Vancouver, and I’ve never done this…disappointing)
45. Stolen a sign (and street pylons, and construction barriers…I’m sure there’s still people in East Van who wonder how the hell the blinking construction divider wound up in the back of their Ford F150 at 5am)
46. Backpacked in Europe (I’d say 50% for this one - it wasn’t a backpack, it was a small rolling portman, but it had backpacking straps so one could wear it as a backpack)
47. Taken a road-trip (many, many, many times…I’m all too familiar with sitting in the backseat of a car/van/truck with guitar cases piled up on your lap for six hours)
48. Gone rock climbing (even with my fear of heights, it was really enjoyable)
49. Midnight walk on the beach (I’ve pretty much done everything you can imagine on a beach at midnight..{ahem}….is my mother going to read this?)
50. Gone sky diving
51. Visited Ireland (been everywhere in the UK except Ireland. Odd)
52. Been heartbroken longer than you were actually in love (this….I…..I’m not going to say anything else. Ever.)
53. In a restaurant, sat at a stranger’s table and had a meal with them (thank you Brian…he who invented the phrase now legendary amongst all of us - “hey, I’m Brian! What are we eating tonight??!?”)
54. Visited Japan
55. Milked a cow
56. Alphabetized your CDs (what can I say…I’m anal about crap like that)
57. Pretended to be a superhero (what childhood comic book geek didn’t???)
58. Sung karaoke (see #1 above…it was a bad night)
59. Lounged around in bed all day (my wife does this weekly)
60. Played touch football
61. Gone scuba diving
62. Kissed in the rain (I live in Vancouver, that’s like having #64 as Got Up In The Morning)
63. Played in the mud (see aforementioned comment about living in Vancouver)
64. Played in the rain (I’m sensing a trend here…MOVE ON!!)
65. Gone to a drive-in theater (yes, thank God I can say this…saw the Wedding Crashers and that horrible movie with Matt Damon and Heath Ledger as the Brothers Grimm at the Drive In out in Langley with Cin - it was a great night of snuggling in the back of our Xterra under a feather comforter with the back hatch open - I’ll always remember that)
66. Visited the Great Wall of China
67. Started a business (and finished it too)
68. Fallen in love and not had your heart broken (had it cracked a couple of times along the way, but she’s handy with the emotional Duct Tape)
69. Toured ancient sites (STONEHENGE…WHERE THE DEMONS LIE!! WHERE THE BANSHEES LIVE AND THEY DO LIVE WELL!!! Yep, back when I was a toddler and years before they stopped letting people run around amongst the ruins…oh yeah, and Glastonbury Abbey, and the Chalice Well, and God knows how many bloody castles in Europe, and the Coliseum in Rome, and…I’ll stop now before Reade kicks my ass)
70. Taken a martial arts class
71. Played D&D for more than 6 hours straight (Christ, I’m a geek…sorry, it was six DAYS straight, right?)
72. Gotten married
73. Been in a movie (do rock videos count?)
74. Crashed a party
75. Gotten divorced
76. Gone without food for 5 days (you must be kidding…me? People would die. You’d hear about it on CNN.)
77. Made cookies from scratch (one of my favourite things to do as a kid…my mother was very encouraging of my efforts in the kitchen, probably why I love to cook now)
78. Won first prize in a costume contest
79. Ridden a gondola in Venice (no damnit…my parents wouldn’t let me - we had to walk everywhere instead)
80. Gotten a tattoo (and much more to come)
81. Rafted the Snake River
82. Been on television news programs as an “expert”
83. Gotten flowers for no reason
84. Performed on stage (ad infinitum…since I was six…and it’s probably not over either)
85. Been to Las Vegas
86. Recorded music (I love the studio. Seriously. Some musician’s hate the studio. I love everything about it, most of all the feeling you get when you go in at 6 in the evening and it’s dark and you come out fourteen hours later and it’s daylight and everyone’s rushing to work and you feel all cool and subterranean and shit…don’t try to understand, unless you’ve been there, you won’t get it)
87. Eaten shark (thank you Salmon House On The Hill)
88. Kissed on the first date (technically it wasn’t a date, right Cin?)
89. Gone to Thailand
90. Bought a house (will be able to tick this one off next summer)
91. Been in a combat zone (does paintball count?)
92. Buried one/both of your parents (I’m making the trembly-bottom-lip face right now, thanks)
93. Been on a cruise ship (I’d like to take Cin to Alaska one of these days, but it seems like every ship that leaves Vancouver gets the Norwalk Virus)
94. Spoken more than one language fluently (in high school, yes…now, not so much)
95. Performed in Rocky Horror
96. Raised children
97. Followed your favorite band/singer on tour (I’ve never been that obsessed…it has to do with the Musician Coolness Factor…although I did hang out for six hours outside the Pacific Coliseum to try and meet Queensryche in 1991.)
98. Passed out cold (I…..ummm…..heh…..awkward.)
99. Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country
100. Picked up and moved to another city to just start over (no, but I’m seriously tempted)
101. Walked the Golden Gate Bridge
102. Sang loudly in the car, and didn’t stop when you knew someone was looking (nope, in fact, I put the window down and sang louder right to her)
103. Had plastic surgery
104. Survived an accident that you shouldn’t have survived (when the doctor says ‘there’s no way you should have walked away from that..’, it’s a little…unnerving. Try to tell me there’s no God after that, and I’ll call you a moron.)
105. Wrote articles for a large publication
106. Lost over 100 pounds (I started doing triathlon, just so I’d never have to do just that)
107. Held someone while they were having a flashback
108. Piloted an airplane (no, but I did sit in the jump chair on a corporate jet last December, and it was one of the coolest things I’ve ever done in my life)
109. Touched a stingray (ummm…ever heard of Steve Irwin? I’ll pass, thanks.)
110. Broken someone’s heart (not proud of that in the least… I was a bit of a slutty jerk when I was younger)
111. Helped an animal give birth
112. Won money on a T.V. game show
113. Broken a bone (oh dear God, I am so looking for something wood to knock on right now…)
114. Gone on an African photo safari (another Top 10 thing)
115. Had a facial part pierced other than your ears
116. Fired a rifle, shotgun, or pistol (I can’t believe my wife has done this and I haven’t…if you need me I’ll be in the closet looking for my manhood behind the washing machine)
117. Eaten mushrooms that were gathered in the wild
118. Ridden a horse (thank you Marcy)
119. Had major surgery (is there really such a thing as minor surgery?)
120. Had a snake as a pet
121. Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
122. Slept for more than 30 hours over the course of 48 hours (did that in January…frickin’ influenza)
123. Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states
124. Visited all 7 continents
125. Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than 2 days
126. Eaten kangaroo meat (no, but I’d be interested to try…heard it’s quite good)
127. Eaten sushi (Good God, we live in Vancouver, you can’t walk twenty feet here without running into a sushi place, a Starbucks, or a person from Hong Kong)
128. Had your picture in the newspaper
129. Changed someone’s mind about something you care deeply about (somewhere out there is a woman who learned to think for herself about right and wrong and her relationship to God or whatever you want to call The Higher Power…you’re welcome…I’ve got some good karma coming back to me there)
130. Gone back to school (…and will do so again, and again, and again…I love to learn)
131. Parasailed
132. Touched a cockroach (inadvertently…I did live in the downtown Eastside for several months)
133. Eaten fried green tomatoes (um…ew. I’m sorry, tomatoes are red. Period. Just like bananas ain’t brown, ever.)
134. Read The Iliad - and the Odyssey (yes, I’m an uncultured slob. Where’s my new issue of Hustler?)
135. Selected one “important” author who you missed in school, and read one of their works
136. Killed and prepared an animal for eating (I take it by animal, fish count? Or does it have to have cloven feet, big doe-y eyes and have a Disney movie named after it?)
137. Skipped all your school reunions (proud of this one…everyone I wanted to stay in contact with after high school, I’ve stayed in contact with after high school)
138. Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language (you can’t tour Europe without doing this at least once…I know they say that English is a common language. They lie.)
139. Been elected to public office (thought about it, seriously. Decided that I have so many skeletons in my closet that I’d never get past a School Trustee without being impeached.)
140. Written your own computer language (well, apparently I’m not THAT much of a geek. I feel better about myself…)
141. Thought to yourself that you’re living your dream (March 1994, driving down to the Capilano Village to get beer and Easter Creme Eggs with Rich, our drummer, after recording backing vocals - a moment in time I’ll never, ever forget)
142. Had to put someone you love into hospice care (not me personally, so I’m not going to count this)
143. Built your own PC from parts
144. Sold your artwork to someone you didn’t know (it’s a goal of mine one day…as soon as I master Sumi-E painting)
145. Had a booth at a street fair
146. Dyed your hair (then promptly got told I looked like Brandon Lee in the Crow…must’ve been the eyeliner I was wearing)
147. Been a DJ (and I got crap for playing the B-52s twice at one party…hell, I thought they were so drunk they wouldn’t care…)
148. Shaved your head (genetics is a bitch. End of lesson.)
149. Caused a car accident (not too proud of that)
150. Saved someone’s life