Carpe You Some Diem!

More interview fun.  If you want to play along, see this post.  You can also send me five questions to answer without putting an interview in your blog, if you want to.

These questions are from Heather, from I’m the Chez & You’re the Macaroni:

1.  If they made a movie of your life, who would play you?

That’s a tough one.  I’ve been compared to Janeane Garofalo since college:

If she played me in a movie, I would be flattered!  I think she’s adorable. 

2.  Everyone has a hidden super power/talent, what is yours?

I have the amazing ability to refill ice cube trays and toilet paper dispensers, to see messes on the livingroom floor that are completely undetectable by the rest of my family, and I can cook a meal, talk on the phone, wash a load of laundry, fold another load, sign permission slips, find the remote control, and pull the baby off the cat ALL AT THE SAME TIME!!! 

3.  What is one goal you would like to accomplish in your life time?

I would like to inspire other people to find beauty in the world around them.  That’s a tall order in a society where it’s fashionable to be jaded and cynical about everything.  But the world is truly a beautiful place if you take the time to stop and look at it.  There is beauty to the pattern of leaves on the sidewalk, or the color of light hitting a building in the evening, or a tiny violet sprouting from a crack in a sidewalk.  It’s all art.

4.  What food do you refuse to eat?

Kentucky Fried Chicken.  I want to like it — it’s so crispy and golden and it looks so good.  But I got food poisoning at a KFC when I was in 9th grade, and was horribly sick.  I was on a field trip to see an exhibit of Egyptian art in Charlotte, NC, and tried to tough it out because I really, really wanted to see the exhibit.  I wound up in the restroom, throwing up my ankle bones.  Next thing I remember, I was being wheeled on a gurney past a huge sculpture of King Ramses II, with a paramedic telling me that I was going to be OK and that my teacher was calling my parents.  I was really sick for about a week, and never did get to see the exhibit.  To this day, even the smell of KFC makes me feel like throwing up.

5.  What is the nicest thing a stranger ever did for you?

When I was in college, a good friend at another school was killed in a swimming accident near Sandstone Falls.  I had finals, so I didn’t make it to the funeral, but I wanted to visit his grave, so I drove to his hometown to visit the cemetary as soon as exams were over.  I expected a small graveyard in this tiny town, but when I got there, the cemetary was huge, sprawling through the forest and all around this hillside, with little, flat markers that you have to stand almost directly on top of to read the engravings.  A friend and I looked all over the place near where we thought he was buried, but never found his grave.  It was starting to get dark, and I had a long way to drive to get home, so I started to give up.  An elderly lady showed up to lock up the gates behind us, and noticed that we looked like we were searching for someone.  She asked who we were looking for, and took my address.  Within a couple days, a beautiful sympathy card arrived in the mail.  Tucked inside was a hand-drawn map of the cemetary with all the landmarks drawn on it, and exact directions to my friend’s grave circled on the paper.