I got this from United Irelander – a new blog I just discovered. Seems like a lot of fun over there. I like it.
Seven things I plan to do before I die.
1. Get my one-woman show produced
2. Novel(s) published
3. Run the Blessing of the Fleet, dammit – hey, maybe I’ll do that next year. Any other Rhode Islanders want to join me?
4. Travel through Central Asia. Countries to see: Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikstan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgzstan. I’d also like to go to Nepal.
5. Get married. Dad walks me down the aisle.
6. Own a house
7. Live in Ireland for an extended period of time
Seven things I can do.
1. I can write
2. I can be loyal as the day is long. If you’re my friend, or my boyfriend … you’ll never get any treachery from me. Loyal, loyal, loyal.
3. I can drive a stick shift
4. I can jitterbug
5. I can remember conversations I had over 20 years ago almost word for word. I’m freaky that way. I’m also freaky about remembering specific body language. How someone leaned back, leaned forward, looked away, leaned in …
6. I have now realized that I am fully capable of keeping plants alive. I have 5 plants in my apartment that are flourishing. This is amazing.
7. I can sing all the lyrics to “Museum Song” from the musical Barnum. At the breakneck speed in which they are sung on the album. So can my sister Jean:
Quite a lotta
Roman terra cotta
Livin’ lava from the flanks of Etna
Statuary
Ride a dromedary
See the Temple tumble and the Red Sea part.
McNamara’s band
The fattest lady in the land
A pickled prehistoric hand
A strand of Pocahontas’ hair
Crow and Sioux
Who’re going to
Be showing you
Some rowing through
A model of the rapids on the Delaware.
Armadillas
Clever caterpillas
Reproductions of the Cyclops’ ret’na
Crystal blowing
Automatic sewing
Venus on a shell and other works of art.
Educated fleas
A tribe of Aborigines
Two ladies joined across the knees
A Mona Lisa made of ice
Hottentots
We’ve gotten in
Forgotten spots
A cotton gin
A night with Lot in Sodom
Better see that twice!
One iguana
Snakes and other fauna
Got no bearded lady but we’re get’na
When you duck out
Take another buck out
Run around the block and see and run around the block and run around the block
And see a new show start.
Seven things I can not do.
1. Love Renee Zellweger or accept her success in any graceful way
2. Ski (I’m sure I could learn, but as of now, I have never skiied.)
3. I cannot take apart a car engine and put it back together and have it still work
4. I cannot fly an airplane
5. I cannot tame a wild animal. I also could not kill an animal. I mean, I’m sure I could – but only in self-defense or if I was hungry. Never ever for sport.
6. I cannot stop myself from watching Notorious and Bringing Up Baby endlessly
7. I cannot deal with s’s
Seven things that I find really attractive about the opposite sex.
1. Smile/Laugh
2. Hands
3. Height (and by that I mean: tall)
4. Good listener, but also good talker.
5. Brain
6. Passion for what he does
7. General curiosity about all things. No “I’m over it” attitude allowed.
Seven things I say the most.
1. Holy crap
2. You have got to be kidding me.
3. What a jag-off
4. That is SO COOL
5. No way.
6. You’re going to be okay, Sheila
7. hahahahahahahahahahahaha
Seven books I love.
1. Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L’Engle
2. Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce
3. Harriet the Spy, Louise Fitzhugh
4. Mating, Norman Rush
5. Hopeful Monsters, Nicholas Mosley
6. Possession, AS Byatt
7. Catch 22, Joseph Heller
Nice list, but why would you want to go to Iran of all places?
Iran has always been a fascination of mine. Or maybe I should say Persia. I would just love to see the old ruins of Persepolis, and there’s a lot else I would like to see. I’d love to go to Isfahan, Shiraz … I’d even like to go to Qom, although … that would be a very weird experience. But it sounds fascinating nonetheless. Sounds like a beautiful rich complex and kind of scary place with a ton of history. And let me say this, although it’s a huge generalization: haven’t met an Iranian person here in the States who wasn’t sharp as a whip, funny, ambitious, warm, loving … I don’t know. I just like their culture. The old Persian culture, the Sufism, etc, the poetry, the music. Not the mullah culture of the past 30 years. :)
Of course I can’t go now. But I hope that someday the situation stabilizes enough so I can go.
Also – I heard they love James Joyce. hahahaha An Iranian friend of mine told me that. Told me he was in a book club in Teheran where they read Ulysses in a group. I just love the image of that. :)
I would love to go to Iran myself someday–a free Iran–just as I would love to go to China. It doesn’t surprise me at all, and I don’t think it would even if I didn’t know you.
But that said, what I REALLY want to talk about is this:
“3. I cannot take apart a car engine and put it back together and have it still work”
Because you MUST know that this, of course, immediately made me think of The Breakfast Club…
BRIAN: So I’m a moron because I can’t make a lamp?
JOHN: No, you’re a genius because you can’t make a lamp.
BRIAN: What do you know about trigonometry?
JOHN: I could care less about trigonometry.
BRIAN: Bender, did you know that without trigonometry there’d be no engineering?
JOHN: Without lamps, there’d be no light.
Jitterbug? Really? Do you still do this in NYC? Are there still jitterbuging clubs?
I saw a funny movie called “Man of the Century”, about a guy in contemporary NYC, but he’s still mentally stuck in the ’20’s…He takes his girlfriend dancing the Charleston at some club, and they’re the only ones on the dance floor…until scads of ancient couples finally make it out there with them!
ron – i love that image! how cool!
I actually learned to jitterbug in college and never really stopped. There was a club here in new York called Swing 46 – it was on (duh) 46th Street and I used to go there all the time, when swing got very big again. It was great. I would dress up, and curl my hair, and wear red lipstick, and just go and dance. The great thing about the whole scene was … well, it reminds me of going to country-western bars, where you can dance with 20 guys a night, no obligation. The whole point is to dance. Not just to pick people up. I love that. I jitterbugged for an hour with this amazing guy who looked like he had stepped out of a 1940s newsreel – he was also an incredible jitterbug dancer. He taught classes. He was unbelievable – the kind of guy who knows how to lead. A rarity. There’s no way you could dance with a guy like that and look bad or awkward. That’s what a good dancer can do – a good leader always makes the woman look graceful.
But anyway – I danced with him for an hour – didn’t even know his name – but we went NUTS with the dancing. It was exhilarating. Then we were like, “Okay, buh-bye, see ya later” and we were on to the next partner.
So fun.
That’s why I love NYC so much! You can have very intense interactions, but with no particular commitments! I once got into an incredibly intense 2 hour discussion with a guy in a diner about a basketball player named Uwe Blab! (no seriously, that was, er, is his name!) We both knew a lot of factoids about this guy, which were new to both of us. At one point the guy behind the counter (we were the only ones there! Which is another strange/beautiful thing about NYC…how you can sometimes be the only person in a place, even though there is a sea of people all around that place…) came out with a pot of coffee and some chocolate cream pie for us…He just watched us have this intense discussion, complete with plays diagrammed with condiments, and then it was done, that guy shook my hand (I didn’t learn his name or he mine!)left, and that was it!
Your dancing story brought that memory back, woosh, all at once!
Yes, but can you sing all the parts to “Your Fault” from Into the Woods quickly?
Or “I’m Not Getting Married Today” from Company?
Sondheim seems to have a thing for fast lyrics…
Seven Things
Another bogart from Sheila. Here are MY Seven Things: Seven things I plan to do before I die. Go to the British Isles for an extended vacation. Go to a basketball game at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Attended a Final Four.
3. I can drive a stick shift
Ah, but can you ride a motorcycle? If so you’ll have the top two on my list.