50 Things About Me

In honor of my 50th post this year, here are 50 things about me. In no particular order:

1. I hate/love alliteration.
2. I'm slow at technology, but give me some time with a gadget and I can (usually/always) figure it out.
3. Wishing people happy birthday tires me out. It's always someone's birthday. (So don't feel offended if I don't send you a personal greeting on your day.)
4. I think I feel that way because I'm pretty nonchalant about my own birthday. It's in the summer, so most of my childhood birthdays were spent alone/with siblings/parents after work. 
5. I judge books by their covers.
6. I'm a proud lefty, despite doing nothing special to be one.
7. A walk always does me good, but if it's crappy outside it's impossible to believe that.
8. Tacos make me happy. 
9. I go into my own head a lot. And get lost/stuck there. It's awesome some days, but inconvenient a lot of the time.
10. I hope to be a lifelong reader...that's the only thing that makes my to-read list not overwhelming, considering:
11. I plan on living past 100. I've always believed that I would.
12. When I was little, my "When I grow up..." was to work in the same office that my mom did and to wear nice clothes to work. I did not have a specific career in mind, and to this day I don't know what I want to be when I grow up.
13. Other options as I got older: gardener, director of an orphanage, taxi driver, pediatrician, teacher, bank teller, anything where I got to use a computer, a morning person, professional book reader, writer...I had/have varied tastes.
14. I love snacks and routinely make meals out of them.
15. I've hidden notes in library books, especially ones that meant a lot to me while I read.
16. My siblings are my best friends.
17. I've always wanted to have kids, but it wasn't until I started dating Jesus that I wanted to be someone's mom.
18. I studied abroad in Rome because I read Eat, Pray, Love the week before study abroad applications were due...before that the plan was to go to London. I'm forever grateful to Elizabeth Gilbert for sending me to Italy instead of England!
19. I always think things are going to take twice as long as they really do, so I give myself obnoxious amounts of time to do them. This is why I'm always early, especially when I go somewhere for the first time.
20. Sometimes I feel nothing during really sad times. Other times I watch an animated film and sob.
21. My biggest pet peeve is when people think they are above the law, especially with minor traffic violations (think: using the right lane even if it's not a lane). I don't know why, but those things irritate me way more than they should.
22. I've never seen Titanic the whole way through. Same with The Notebook.
23. I like things to be just so before I start a project, which is why I tend to consider myself a perfectionist procrastinator - things get put off because "I'm not ready," or "It's not ready," not because I don't want to do them.
24. Because of #23, I've taken deliberate steps to jump in to things without worrying about the outcome or if I've planned things out enough. I started small: freewrite journaling, art projects just for fun, low stakes work projects - and have worked my way up to bigger things that I usually hold back on: interior decorating projects, writing projects, even this blog is a way for me to "just do it" without making sure all parts are perfect first.
25. I drink more water now than I ever have before in my life and it is amazing.
26. My favorite not-guilty pleasure purchase: plants.
27. April Ludgate-Dwyer would be one of my best friends, if either of us believed in that sort of thing.
28. 27 is the first age where people were genuinely shocked to hear that that's how old I was. At 26 it was, "Oh, you look younger than that." At 27, "You're HOW OLD?!??!?!?!" What a difference a year makes, I guess.
29. I'm the best at not showering.
30. I love a good routine almost as much as I love making changes. (I am large, I contain multitudes.)
31. If I randomly selected an item from my closet, odds are it would be a) blue and/or b) striped or plaid.
32. While I still need to read Marie Kondo's The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, I've done a lot of cleaning and getting rid of "things" this year. I prefer to collect places and people.
33. That being said, I love collecting things as well. It comes from my strength as an intellect - I love collections, including tangible and intangible ones. This also explains my reading habits - I don't read to hone any specific theory, but to add tidbits of knowledge to my collection.
34. I have blue eyes, which is a thing my boyfriend now knows (after 4 years of dating). He thought they were green and/or that they changed colors depending on who knows what. My mood perhaps?
35. My first favorite band was Hanson. They were soon upstaged by Coldplay.
36. I have a sweet tooth, but when I'm hungry I prefer something salty first.
37. I used to dye my hair consistently - all colors. I stopped right after college, until I started again and stopped again. Right now it's its "original" color, but I have a feeling that might change soon...
38. I have two tattoos and two ideas for new ones.
39. I love maps. I am my father's daughter.
40. I tend to be a rule-follower, and I rarely got in trouble in school, which made it easy to get away with not following the rules when I didn't believe in them. Rebelling for me was (is?) less overt acting out and more calm refusal to listen to authority.
41. I'm a member of the Clean Plate Club - I (generally) only eat when I'm hungry, so you better believe I'm eating everything I serve myself.
42. I don't nap, but when I do...it's a 4 hour affair.
43. I believe Experiences > Things
44. When I'm stressed, I clean. When I'm restless, I clean. When the sun is shining and I have salsa music playing, I clean.
45. I'm not physically flexible, but mentally I'm an Olympic gymnast.
46. I enjoy planning for events as much as the event itself. It could be a vacation, a party, or a Sunday drive - thinking about it brings me the same amount of joy as being there in the moment.
47. I'm frugal to a fault. If I can thrift it, DIY it, or go without it, I will. This allows me to "splurge" on things like ticket to Puerto Rico - remember, Experiences > Things!
48. I kill at making lists - to do lists, packing lists, life lists...it fits in with being a collector and an organizer.
49. My favorite grown up dish to make is salsa chicken with all the fixings.
50. My favorite I have no energy to cook dish is pasta with a little olive oil, Parmesan, and salt & pepper.