100 Things

1. My carotid artery runs over my mandible (lower jaw bone) on the left side, and my hand tends to drift there aimlessly to feel my pulse. It's kind of cool.
2. It pulses stronger when I have a headache.
3. Which is a lot. Rarely does a day go by when I don't get a headache.
4. Mostly because my hair is long and heavy, and I usually pull it into a ponytail/braid/bun at some point in the day, and that gives me a headache.
5. I always, always tip 20 percent.
6. Not because I'm a generous tipper, but because the math is much easier to do. Look at the first number and double it.
7. I'm terrible at math. Always have been. I have to add 8 and 5 by counting on my fingers. Every. Single. Time.
8. But I love algebra. Mostly because it doesn't really have anything to do with numbers.
9. I never learned how to do long division. When I have kids and they come to me for math help, I'll send them to their father.
10. But I'll love it when they come to me for reading or writing help. Though they'll probably hate it.
11. I want kids someday, but not any day soon. One or two, but I have to have a girl.
12. Even though I know that at some point in her life she'll hate me for no good reason at all. Though I suppose that's better than hating me for a good reason.
13. I still feel guilty for hating my own mother for no good reason at all when I was younger.
14. I love her dearly now.
15. Even though we disagree about almost everything.
16. I type really fast. Like, really, really fast. As in, 110 Words Per Minute (WPM) with 96% accuracy.
17. And I'm very proud of this fact. It's difficult for me to discern which things I do well and which things I'm terrible at, but I know that typing is something I do well.
18. Another thing I know I do well is peeling bananas. I can peel an entire banana with one quick motion. It's all in the wrist.
19. And the fact that I worked at Smoothie King for five years.
20. Peeled a lot of bananas there in five years. Approximately three 2-gallon tubs per shift.
21. And I never, ever got sick of smoothies. Or bananas.
22. Though I am allergic to bananas. They burn my mouth. Doesn't stop me from eating them.
23. Before I left Smoothie King for good in 2004, I trained my little brother to take my position. He still works there, which means that a Frankenburger has been working at Smoothie King Store 254 for almost a decade, since the store's doors first opened in 1999.
24. Every smoothie flavor at Smoothie King has a number, and I still remember most of them.
25. Whenever someone I know is going to Smoothie King, I ask what smoothie they intend to order and tell them the corresponding number, urging them to order by number. Because it freaks out the employees.
26. Is Grape Expectations II.
27. Making smoothies is another thing I know for sure I do well.
28. All the subject/pronoun disagreement in #25 really, really bothers me.
29. But lately I'm all for the embracing of "they" as the gender-neutral third-person singular pronoun.
30. Not because I think it's a good option but because I think it's the best we've got, and also because that's the direction our language is already headed.
31. But I'm NOT okay with the direction the apostrophe is headed.
32. Every single time I see an incorrect apostrophe it breaks my heart a little.
33. When it became my job to care about grammar, something in my life clicked. I can't explain it, except to say that I feel somehow that this is what I was meant to do.
34. It's a small life, but I'm okay with that.
35. Is lemon hi-protein.
36. One of my favorite quotes is from the Third Eye Blind song "Semi-Charmed Life."
37. "The four right chords can make me cry."
38. Music is my life.
39. I would rather go blind than deaf.
40. Which is really peculiar, since I'm a copyeditor by trade and an almost 100% visual learner.
41. And I love to read.
42. But all that would mean nothing to me without music.
43. I chose English as my major because I wanted to be a music critic.
44. Journalism was my original minor, but I changed it to Business sophomore year.
45. Junior year I contemplated changing it to French.
46. Senior year I wanted desperately to change it to Poli Sci. But by then it was too late, and I had suffered through too many terrible business classes to throw it all away.
47. I wanted to stay in college forever.
48. I am an excellent student, but I am not an excellent employee.
49. Mostly because I struggle with authority figures. Just ask any of my bosses.
50. I take this to mean that I should probably find a job in which I am my own boss.
51. But I think that I would self-destruct in this scenario rather quickly. Especially if the job were writing.
52. Adulthood has been difficult for me so far.
53. My quarter-life crisis began the day I graduated from college in May 2005 and hasn't ended.
54. I kind of don't expect it to end. Ever.
55. Though I feel it should be called a third-life crisis. It's a little risky to presume I'll be living to 100.
56. I don't like to tempt fate.
57. I knock on wood a lot.
58. I've been watching TV pretty much my whole life.
59. My first favorite adult TV show was Silver Spoons, which ran originally until I was three.
60. I also loved Murphy Brown, Cheers, Twin Peaks, Northern Exposure, Sisters, Ally McBeal, Friends and a whole slew of other shows I probably should not have been allowed to watch but, through some miracle of God, was (Thank you, Mom!).
61. I currently love It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The Office, Project Runway, Grey's Anatomy, The Hills, What Not to Wear and America's Next Top Model.
62. My taste in television has gotten significantly worse over time. Or maybe what I have to choose from has.
63. At the age of ten I became obsessed with the Kennedys and, more specifically, the assassination. The fact that this is number 63 is not a coincidence.
64. I also don't think it's a coincidence that Dallas is the first city I chose to live in as an adult.
65. Working in advertising has broken me of using the serial (Oxford) comma, even though I still very much agree with its use theoretically. For a case in point, see #s 60 and 61.
66. I love to smoke, but I don't let myself do it very often.
67. Partly because I believe I will die from cancer. Before the age of 100.
68. #67 is a form of knocking on wood.
69. But #68 cancels it out.
70. I have always been this absurdly morbid. For a case in point, see #63.
71. I've felt since I was a little girl that I have big thighs.
72. For this reason I've been wearing high heels for over a decade, since those high-heeled clog Candies became so popular in 1997 or so ( the ones Jenny McCarthy made so famous).
73. The secret to walking in high heels, if you ask me, is a long gait. Stretch your leg out as far as it can go, and then stretch it further, and then step. Repeat. Once you get better at this, speed it up. Once you get even better, try putting one foot in front of the other in a straight line. Once you get even better still, try swinging your hips a little, looking straight ahead with determination and allowing your hair to blow behind you. This, ladies, is a runway walk. Use it carefully but as often as possible because it is fabulous.
74. My favorite place to use the runway walk is at the airport.
75. I've tried very hard not to begin more than two numbers in a row with "I." Even though it's plainly obvious that this entire thing is meant to be all about me. (There are three in a row, by the way, just a few numbers up.)
76. I believe I am highly narcissistic. For a case in point, see #s 1-100.
77. Part of the reason I don't want kids anytime soon is that I want to be sure I'm not simply attempting to perpetuate my own self. (Not that that's why everyone has kids.)
78. I want to be an expatriate someday very soon.
79. Even though the only other country I've ever been to is Mexico.
80. And I don't have a passport.
81. I choose France.
82. Because I've wanted to be fluent in French since I was in eighth grade.
83. I am a third child out of four.
84. And I married a third child out of four.
85. I don't think this is a coincidence.
86. Because, for the most part, I don't believe in coincidences.
87. The movie i heart huckabees changed my life.
88. As did Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Lost in Translation.
89. Going to the movies is my very favorite thing to do on weekends.
90. I still use my college student ID to get a student discount at theatres.
91. It is the same ID I received at freshman orientation. It's held together with tape, my last name has changed and I no longer look anything like the 18-year-old Spring in the picture.
92. I rarely lose things.
93. And I prefer to spell "theatre" "re" instead of "er." Not sure why, though Firefox spellcheck doesn't like it. Firefox spellcheck also doesn't like "spellcheck" as one word.
94. I am addicted to Flonase nasal spray.
95. On more than one occasion, I've shot up right there at the pharmacist's counter because I couldn't go one more second without it.
96. I'm also addicted to coffee.
97. I grind my own coffee beans every morning and make it as strong as Starbucks (using Starbucks beans).
98. Chad asked that I quit coffee as my Christmas present to him a few years ago. I did but realized after a few weeks that mornings without coffee are nearly unbearable. Not because of my addiction but because the ritual of coffee is so very important to me.
99. It has been obscenely easy for me to write 100 facts about myself.
100. Though I'm wondering why these are the 100 facts that made the list, as if the list has a life of itself outside of any plans I had made for it.
(101. But I've learned that a lot of things are like that.)