I just wasted, er spent, a ridiculous amount of time doing this “25 random things” exercise on Facebook (it is actually pretty fun, which is why I did it). You just write twenty-five completely random things about yourself. Decided to post it here, too. I’ve changed one because in the five minutes since I pushed “publish” a better idea came to me.

1. I’m the eldest of five children and the only one with red hair, which I “got” from my great-grandma Ida Snyder. We almost named CJ after her; except he turned out to be a CJ instead.
2. I play piano, some classical, but mostly by ear. I write exceptionally cheesy songs. They always make use of the same four chords.
3. I have a minor in Peace and Conflict Studies.
4. At one point in my life, I was certain I would do a doctorate, but instead became a “terminal masters”; ie. stopped with an MA in English Lit.
5. I played Anne of Green Gables in high school. I taught drama at summer camp.
6. For several years in my early teens, we lived in the country, and I had ponies.
7. I really can’t ice skate, but loved roller skating as a kid.
8. I take up jogging every few months, but never stick with it.
9. I met my husband before we’d heard of email, and therefore have a collection of fat letters he wrote to me that spring. They smell like patchouli.
10. Before children, Kevin and I used to go off-road cycling on ski trails.
11. I was homeschooled for a year and a half: grade eight and part of grade nine. This coincided with the ponies.
12. If Albus had been a girl, he would have been named Lucia. If Apple-Apple had been a boy, she would have been Teddy. If Fooey had been a boy, she would have been Walter. For CJ, see above.
13. I worked as a copy editor at a newspaper; it was my only “real” job.
14. My first job was baling hay, age twelve, on the neighbour’s farm. And picking stones. He paid us $1.50 an hour, and I was over the moon. Honestly, I would have done it for free.
15. I was born in Hamilton, Ontario. My parents are both American. I have dual citizenship, and feel like I should know more of the history of both countries.
16. I’ve lived in Ontario, Germany, Ohio, and Nicaragua, and have visited Spain, Switzerland, Belgium, China, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, and Trinidad & Tobago. When I was twenty-one, I drove across the continent with my parents and siblings.
17. My friend Katie, my brother Christian, and I tried to spend the night camping on the barn roof in sleeping bags once. Yes, on top of the roof. Fortunately, we couldn’t fall asleep and decided to come inside. Ditto, the time my brothers and I tried to spend the night in the “treehouse” we’d built out of scrap boards.
18. I used to play a lot of card games. Now I can’t remember any of the rules.
19. I was in the room when my sister Edna was born. We are twelve and a half years apart, and no one ever guesses we’re related when we’re side by side.
20. We moved often when I was growing up, and the longest I’ve lived in one place is here, in the house Kevin and I bought a little over five years ago.
21. I like to walk, in almost any weather.
22. I prefer hanging laundry to dry, and washing dishes by hand.
23. I love cooking from scratch, and baking, but I can’t sew or knit, despite having been taught these skills by grandmothers and various other motherly figures at different points in my life.
24. I was more than two weeks overdue, and my mom spent two days being induced before she went into labour. I’m a Capricorn, but sometimes I wonder.
25. I have a knee-jerk resistence to change, but actually thrive on it.