8 Facts About Me Meme
1. I used to play piano and saxophone, well enough, as a matter of fact, to teach both. Today, though, I took my very first guitar lesson.
2. Worst job moment #1: When I worked at the Cytogenetics Lab, I often worked with products of conception (POC), ie., what you get after a miscarriage or stillbirth, in order to test for chromosome abnormalities that caused the miscarriage. During training, we received a feus, about 2 or 3 inches long. The guy training me, Tom, said, "Okay, transfer it to a petri dish, then use two scalpels to chop it into mush."
3. Worst job moment #2: When I worked in a research lab in college (diabetes research), I worked with rats and mice. I was wearing a heavy leather suede work glove in case they tried to bite me. I was training the tech and said, "It's just in case, but they never bite." Then the rat squirmed right on cue and bit my hand right through the glove.
4. I've lived my entire life in Michigan (I love Michigan, but I'm not sure this is something to be proud of). In order: Davison, East Lansing, Southgate, Lake Orion, Oxford.
5. My first car was a maroon Dodge Omni. (I was 22).
6. My wife and I will have been married 21 years in September, but we dated 8 years before that. In other words, I'm 43 and we'll have been together for 3/4 of it.
7. Oldest memory: my brother's birthday party when he got a Handy Andy Tool Kit. I think I was 3 or 4.
8. I'm happier now than I've ever been.
Well, you're tagged if you want to be.
Cheers,
Mark Terry
posted by Mark Terry at 11:58 AM
8 Comments:
Fellow Michigander!
When did you live in East Lansing? I grew up there...went to ELHS, then Michigan State. My parents still live in EL, and while I spent most of my younger years waiting to get out, now I kind of miss it. My favorite place is Higgins Lake, where we have a cottage. If I ever make enough money writing, I'd live up there.
Cheers!
Dark Scribe
Go Green!
I was there 1982-1986.
My sister owns a condo on Higgins. If I make enough money writing (or robbing banks, or...) a place on Higgins is high on my list, too.
Oooo this is fun.
1. I have a black belt in karate. Yes, I can kill a man with my bare hands but I'd hate to get my hands dirty. I don't even like gardening. Killing? Ewwww, blood! I'd rather do it on the clean white page.
2. Worst job; I worked as a dental assistant. I couldn't take the blood. eewwwww.
3. Most fun job; I was once a bouncer in a male strip club. Basically the job intaled pulling drunken woman off the guys. I was paid well and it was always funny. Some women go crazy in those places!
4. I can watch forensic shows with dead bodies no problem. But medical shows like ER & House gross me out. Ewwww, blood.
5. I've lived in NJ & Texas. I didn't last long in Texas. But the peeps were nice. I think thats what got me? Why was everyone being so nice??? I had to get back to NJ where everyone ignores everyone else.
6. My first car was a '65 mustang convertible. I loved that car.
7. I beat you, Mark! I've been married 26 years and I'm only 49 (soon the big 50-I can't wait!) Weird to think I've been married more then half my life. But its good too.
8. Life lesson; I've been rich and I've been poor. It easy to be happy either way.
Smiling in NJ
Jeannie
I got your postcard! Great cover art!
Jeannie,
Just got my certificate to be reviewed to go to first degree brown in Sanchin-ryu karate this week. Should have the belt in the next month or two--whenever I get around to sending in the certificate and then attending the black belt class to be evaluated. Next belt after that is black.
Hard to go wrong with the older Mustangs.
I've studied Kardojitzuru and Goyonru. (not sure i spelled that right--shame on me!) I originally took karate because I'm a coward at heart and can't stop watching cop/forensic shows.
I believe it is definately the best excercise!
Not a big fan of chain letters (aka memes), and I thought long and hard before participating. But it was more fun than expected. Thanks for playing along!
Okay, I'll play.
1. I play piano well enough to hire myself out for weddings, and I sing well enough to attract some very low-rent gigs. I just bought myself an electric cello. I sound like a dying goose, but I'm having a good time.
2. Worst job moment #1: Taking a job as an "engineering assistant" on an offshore natural gas platform, only to find that I'd be working as a "roustabout," chipping paint and running for oversized pipe wrenches when anyone called for one.
3. Worst job moment #2: As a 22-year-old female computer science teacher, entering a classroom filled with 25 19-year-old men expecting me to teach them how to teach FORTRAN. No, wait a minute. That might have been my best job moment.
4. I live in north Florida, which is great. Almost no winter. Brutal summers, but I don't care, because I hate winter. I grew up in south Mississippi, where the same things are true.
5. My first car was a 1972 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, mustard yellow, with a black vinyl roof and a black interior. I wish I still had it.
6. My husband and I have been married 17 years this month. My first marriage lasted 7 years. I'm 45. I've been married over half my life, and essentially all my adult life. Hmmm.
7. Oldest memory: An instantaneous snapshot-type image of a black-and-white TV with President Kennedy's flag-draped coffin being carried off an airplane. I was 23 months old. For years, my family said, you can't possibly remember that. I have stuck by my guns. They believe me now.
8. When was I happiest? When my first and third child was born. When my second child came home from the hospital after 97 days, weighing 4 whole pounds and 12 ounces. When my husband and I took a second honeymoon to Hawaii last year.
You wrote:
"3. Worst job moment #2:. . .. the rat squirmed right on cue and bit my hand right through the glove."
I also worked in a lab in college, EPA's Breidenbach Center in Cincinnati. I had to operate on rats to remove a lobe of their livers. Then we would dose them with various tritiated halo-methanes. Then we would wait several weeks. Then I would operate to remove some more liver. Then we'd wait again. Then we'd sacrifice the rats and remove the rest of the liver.
All the liver bits got ground up and treated and extracted and run through various spectrometers and what not. The work was supposed to help establish safe levels of halo-methanes in drinking water.
My point: I got a LOT of rats bites. And most of MINE were mildly radioactive.
Given what I write, it probably won't ever get into a novel (which is something you have going for you, which is nice) but I usually win the "worst job" derby at cocktail parties.
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