The first time I ever tied my shoes, I had them on the wrong feet.

It kind of took away from the triumph.

Speaking of Jon Stewart, did anyone watch last night's TDS? Loved the Big Brother/spying kitty bit, as well as "This Is Wiretap."

I can't draw. I can't dance. I can move in rhythym, because I am musical, but the movements are not particularly pretty.

Music's where I'm at. Since age 11, the longest stretch I've gone without being in at least one chorus is 6 months, after I graduated college in December, and auditions for Symphony Chorus weren't until July or August. In high school, I was in three choruses, plus voice lessons. In college, I had chorus, voice lessons, and four years of Madrigal dinner. I've sung from Soprano I to Alto II, I've sung in a capella Christmas carolling quartets, I've done church jobs and weddings, including one where the participants disliked the patriarchal implications of "Lord", and rewrote the words to hymns.

Someone asked about this recently...

The 2006 [hurricane] season officially begins June 1, but any tropical storms that form at any time this year would be part of its tally. The first name on the list is Alberto.

11pm on Friday is often just-getting-off-work time for me.

Okay, question: how many people here fear swimming in deep water? in the pool? in a lake? in the ocean?

I don't have a fear of the depth of the water so much as trepidation about the size of the critters that could be in the water.

Of the folks I hang out with during the summer I'm the least likely to swim and I'm the one raised in the most urban environment. I don't know if it's cultural, or if I'm just a weaker swimmer because of lack of opportunity.

can you ride a bike? Do a cartwheel? Catch, throw, hit a ball? Jump rope? Skate?

Yes to all of the above, although I doubt I could do a graceful cartwheel now and I had trouble hitting a ball until I got glasses. I was better with a skateboard (old school narrow board) than with skates.

I can play several woodwinds and some percussion, but every time I pick up my guitar I have to re-learn the same chords.

I can kind of understand square dancing in elementary, but they really shouldn't have made us do it in Jr High. That was lame.

My mother insisted that I take several years of cooking and sewing classes in 4H (urban 4H clubs are just sad). So now I hate to cook or sew even though I know how.

I find that trying to exercise via swimming is so boring -- I used to work fractions of how close I was to done on every lap -- that injecting some actual terror into the routine might make the experience worthwhile.

I can be bored more entertainingly other places, though (like on the treadmill), and won't have to wash my hair afterwards.

Plei, did you get the dvds I sent you? I realized that I had not yet YSId the final episode.

I used the bunny-ears method of shoe-tying for years and years, Sue. I blame my left-handedness.

Me too. On the lefthandedness thing.

I've done church jobs and weddings, including one where the participants disliked the patriarchal implications of "Lord", and rewrote the words to hymns.

Dude, the church I grew up in does this to CHRISTMAS CAROLS. No Lord, no "him" when referring to Jesus. JESUS. A MAN. @@

I can draw, but everything I draw comes out looking the same, to me. (Like, I can't copy anybody else's style, not a bird looks like a bicycle.)

I realized this when I looked back at an art book my 7th grade had done, and realized without remembering it that I had allowed two students to claim my drawings as theirs. I just recognized my own work, even 15 years later.

What IS 4-H? I vaguely have the impression that it is rabbit-breeding and making jam -- is it a farm-club thing?

What IS 4-H? I vaguely have the impression that it is rabbit-breeding and making jam -- is it a farm-club thing?

Pretty much.

urban 4H clubs are just sad

Hee! Suburban ones aren't much better, even when they're close enough to farmland to have a few members with livestock to show. My sister got a sewing project chosen as first alternate to State Fair, and I got an electrical project sent to State Fair, but I don't really count that as mine, since my dad did about 60% of the work involved (when the judges questioned me on technique in Springfield, I was really thrown for a loop and lucky to get a red 2nd-place ribbon there).

Still, 4-H was more fun than Brownies for me (Kris and I stayed in the club for about 10 years).