25 Random Things about Me


1. I hate writing lists like this but once I get into it I can't stop.

I also hate numbering things, so I'm not going to. Just stop reading when you get bored.

I live with my husband in Florence, Oregon, a town of 6000 on the EDGE OF NOWHERE. We're surrounded on 3 sides by wilderness and on the other by the Pacific Ocean. I find that trees and water make pretty good company.

We have seen possums, raccoons, deer, bear, coyotes and cougars in our neighborhood. Fortunately not at the same time.

My husband and I are best friends. Actually we've been out on a date since 1977, but who's counting?

I was born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1941, so I know all about saying "ma'am", wearing frilly dresses and white gloves and putting up with bigots, Baptists, and their WHITE ONLY and COLORED ONLY signs.

I can speak Southern if pressed and love Southern folklore, but I'm really glad I haven't lived in the South for the last 20 years.

I went to Vanderbilt University. I hated college and nobody ever knew it since I was so popular and went out on about a thousand dates.

In 1989, I went to Wyoming and was "born again" in the Rocky Mountains. I wanted to move out west just so I could see all the amazing, mind-blowing scenery, and I'm happy to say that over the last 20 years, I've seen most of it, except for Yosemite and Taos. I prefer traveling by car and I hate RVs.

To me, California is hands-down the most beautiful state in the US. My single favorite spot though is the Sonoran desert near Tucson, Arizona.

I think in one of my previous lives, I lived in the giant fir forests of the Pacific Northwest so I must have been a NW coast native American of some sort. They are said to be fat and lazy, and I certainly never had the stamina to be a pioneer.

The only 2 cities I'd live in if I were rich are San Francisco and Paris. I've been to both of them multiple times, and they both feel oddly like home to me.

One of my favorite sights is the snowcapped peaks of the Sisters, in the Cascades of central Oregon, as seen from over 100 miles away right outside Eugene. I can never get over being able to see mountains from that far away!

I love living in Oregon, a wacky, rural-yet-progressive blue state where the biggest crowd of supporters for Obama turned out in Portland. The biggest one before the inauguration crowd, that is.


I really enjoyed living in Boston for 2 years and learning how to get in shouting matches with rude salesclerks. Also beating out rude Boston drivers who tried to turn left in front of me.


After traveling to various US cities several times a year from 1990-2005, I haven't been out of my house since then, except to go to Portland (a 3 hour drive) about 6 times.

I was Miss Maury County, Tennessee in 1957 when I was 15 years old. I thought the whole thing was hilarious. One of my duties was to be Queen of Mule Day and ride on a convertible in a parade.

When I was a child in Birmingham, Alabama I used to go barefooted in the summers and my feet would be black from coal dust at the end of the day.

I was a therapist for 20 some-odd years, both a counselor in private practice in Virginia and also in state agencies.

I would love to be a painter, but I'm too lazy to learn painting techniques. I can't stand "wasting" stuff and you have to use untold amounts of paint and paper before you get good at painting.

I have an almost-PhD in counseling psychology from the University of Virginia. Couldn't face the dissertation writing part!

My idol is my grandmother. She was married to a country doctor, raised and canned all her own vegetables, grew and preserved her own fruits, and raised, killed and cured her own meats. I never saw her not wearing high heels, even at breakfast, when she rose each day to make 3 kinds of bread. She made everything from scratch including churning butter and still considered herself a "lady." My grandfather rode his horse to make house calls and showered my grandmother with jewelry and furs that she cared nothing about but wore anyway. Ladies do that.

My one regret in life is that I never got to live in Australia and develop that adorable accent.

Best birthday cake - when I went to school in Aix-en-Provence, France, where I had my 21st birthday party.

I'm "off" current popular restaurant cuisine right now. I don't like sushi or anything seared, nor do I like "foam", so I'll just stay home till the current fads are over. Then I'm going to the French Laundry and spend $3000 on one meal.

I am almost completely disabled and spend 95% of my time lying in bed playing with my laptop.

I don't like people to tell me what to do, and I don't like to tell other people what to do. Unless I'm the head honcho, then watch out. :)

I have never cared about how my house looks, inside or out, even though I love to visit other people's beautiful homes.

This summer I had an animal communicator tell me that my dearly departed cat Miss Zippy sent me a "black feather trailing dust" which I thought was hooey till my husband pointed out a black crow's feather he had picked up in the (dusty) driveway and brought into the house the day after Zippy was killed in the yard by a coyote.

I have 2 horrible vices: watching American Idol and Survivor. No, make that three. I also watch Young and Restless. That's how I found, from watching an old episode on Youtube, that in the 70s, there were only 2 commercials at a time and now there are six. I knew it! I hate commercials!

I find it amusing that whole restaurants are now devoted to "Southern cuisine" i.e. the same stuff my grandmother made 3 times a day.

I taught French right out of college and was told twice to get out of the teacher's part of the cafeteria because I was mistaken for a student. Also a senior boy (who wasn't in one of my classes) asked me out on a date.

I've been married to 2 vastly opposite men who were both Leos, and that proves to me that astrological signs mean nothing. Not to me anyway. Also my totally opposite daughters are both Pisces ... and my mother and I are both Aries. What a crock!

I had to get a doll for Christmas every year when I was a child, and I hated dolls. I also got a doctor's kit though, which I liked.

I never did any babysitting before I had my first child at age 26. That probably explains a lot.

I wonder who's luckier, people who are born and grow up and live in the same town with most of their family - or people like me who get to travel, live in different parts of the country and know a lot of different kinds of people around the world?

To me, Southerners have the best manners, but Westerners are friendly from the heart. Even in cities.

I get the creeped-out heebie-jeebies in flat land like the Mid-west. I gotta see a mountain in the distance.

I'm almost 68 and I don't have a single gray hair yet.

I've been "living green" all my life, so it's no big deal to me.

I find the expressions "research shows..." and "studies show..." really absurd and meaningless. Like the other day when I heard "studies show that children who eat meals with their parents tend to think their parents are proud of them." In my day the only kids who didn't eat meals with their parents were orphans.

My favorite spot in the world is Zermatt, Switzerland when the skies clear and the Matterhorn looms over the town, sucking the breath out of you the first time you see it.

I am a fair-weather Atlanta Braves fan who is almost ready to give up watching them lose more than they win. Pathetic. Where's Ted Turner when you need him?

My Maine coon cat Rafa is named after Raphael Nadal, the current #1 men's tennis player in the world. They are both equally big, lanky, gorgeous, long-haired specimens, and they both speak with accents. LOL