I must credit some smart and creative people before me -- namely The Nightfly and John Derbyshire, two of my favorite bloggers -- for inspiring me with this neat idea for a post. Namely, what are 10 things you've never done in your life? Here's my list.
1) I have never traveled anywhere outside North America. In fact, I've never been far at all from the U.S. border -- Victoria, Montreal, Toronto, Nuevo Laredo. That's the exent of my international globetrotting.
2) I have never tried hard drugs, not even marijuana. Even if I didn't have moral, legal or medical reservations, the acrid stench of marijuana alone would keep me from lighting up a doobie. I once sat for two hours behind a toking pothead at a Weather Report concert, and if I ever was tempted to just "try it once," all I'd have to do is bring up memories of that wretched evening to nip it in the bud, no pun intended.
3) I have never ridden a motorcycle. Okay, once when I was about 13 I rode for maybe 20 seconds on the back of a friend's tiny Honda cycle, but that hardly qualifies. Now that I think back, he was also the same friend who introduced me to cigarettes (a habit I luckily didn't pick up). So I guess he was one of my teenaged bad influences.
4) I have never tried any of the "dangerous" sports. In this category I include skydiving, bungee jumping, parasailing, surfing, windsurfing, skiing, hang gliding, mountain climbing, flying a plane, tightrope walking, ballooning and attending a European soccer match. I once went waterskiing, but since they have small dogs in sunglasses and aqua queens in dresses and beehive hairdos routinely do this as well, I hardly think it qualifies as "dangerous."
5) I have never served on a jury. I'm afraid when it comes to doing my civic duty in the jury box, I'm always a bridesmaid, never a bride. I've been called many times, but every time something happened to prevent my serving -- the jury was seated before they got to me, the defendant plead out and canceled the trial, the prosecution team was eliminated by mobsters, whatever.
6) I have never eaten sushi or caviar. I have made a pact with my palate that all seafood must have at least a passing acquaintance with a stove, oven, grill or campfire before I will ingest said ocean delicacy.
7) I have never "gotten" the movie "2001". All the stuff with the apes, the bone being thrown up in the air, the trip through the colored lights, the baby in the womb, the old man. What? WHAT? I always heard that hippies seeing the movie when it first came out in 1968 said that being high helped you understand all the cosmic meanings. Maybe that's the key, but remember No. 2 above.
8) I have never been in a true fistfight. Being a fat kid with glasses in junior high school, I was picked on by bullies and suffered through the push-and-shove scuffles that condition invited. But the kind of fistfight you see in the movies -- with fists hitting faces, blood gushing and people flying through the air and rolling around in the dirt -- I've never had that happen, and I'm sure not looking for trouble now.
9) I have never learned a foreign language. Truth in blogging requires me to admit that I took four semesters of Spanish in college, but my remaining store of Spanish words and phrases is muy pico. I might be able to ask where the red house is or order a burrito while in Matamoros, but that's about it. As far as a true working knowledge of a foreign language, el zippo.
10) I have never seen or been invited to President Bush's ranch in Crawford. But it's only about 15 miles from my front door, and I voted for him twice, so here's hoping.
Quote of the day:
"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."
--Mark Twain
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