My good-but-busy friend Nancy tagged me for a meme. I tend to not like memes, since I harbour a secret conviction that no one else likes to read them, even though I am quite happy to read them when other people do them.
But right now is a perfect time for me to do a meme, and if you really don’t care to learn anymore about ME! you can skip this post. Best of all, I won’t even know. How’s that for guilt-free?
I’m sitting in the in-laws’ living room, playing an extract from the opera Carmen on my laptop. The twins are supposed to decide what instrument the voices of the women are imitating. Yes, we are finally taking that last music exam for CNED, and since I’m stuck sitting here playing them extracts off their music CD, I might as well type rather than just stare at the flowing colours of the Windows Media Player. My in-laws are sitting in their two stuffed armchairs, between them a marble-topped table with a lit lamp now cluttered with today’s paper, which they are sharing between themselves. They are discussing Dobie Gillis, a TV show that aired before I was born and starred Gilligan, only before he was Gilligan. I don’t know what prompted this, but it makes for an interesting time; the CD playing, the twins asking questions and writing industriously, the in-laws discussing 60s TV shows and then telling each other which comic strips are good today.
So, on to the meme.
Here are the rules:
1. Each player answers questions about themselves.
2. At the end of the post, tag 5 people by posting their names.
3. Go to their site/blog and leave a comment telling them they’ve been tagged. Invite them to your site/blog so they can read the tagged post.
4. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve completed your tagged post.

Right, I think I can handle that! Onward and upward! (Kids are reading Narnia again; NOT going to see the movie if I can help it!)

1. What were you doing 10 years ago?
Let’s see, it’s 2008 now. So 1998. Um…the twins were one so that wasn’t the year we took them to Hawaii when they were only 4 months old to meet the in-laws, who used to live there before they moved to Hemet (pronounce Hemet with proper disgust tinged with amazement…they left a tropical island paradise for a small dusty town in the California desert? Yeah).
1998 is pretty much just a blur, to be honest. Elliot turned 3 that year and the twins were one. All 3 were in diapers. Do you mean 10 years ago to the day? Cuz I have no idea.
2. What are 5 things on your “To Do” list?
Finish CNED; celebrate in some way
Go swimming
Pack up my house (after returning to it). Have AWESOME garage sale. Want to come?
Spend significant time with my mother
Move to Morocco (which has a whole subset of things underneath it, including finding a house, getting the kids into school there, learning Darija, meeting the neighbours and making new friends, etc)
3. What are 5 snacks you enjoy? (In no specific order)
Chips and salsa (esp. Kettle Tias and Emerald Valley med salsa)
Kettle chips, especially salt and vinegar or Spicy Thai
Dark, dark chocolate, sometimes with orange peel or coffee beans in it
Popcorn
Handfuls of Honey-Nut Cheerios snuck shamefully from the box
4. Name some things you would do if you were a millionaire.
Hire a really good Arabic tutor for Elliot, a professional. Fly them in from Lebanon or someplace like that. Find a better situation for my mother and pay for it. Go shopping. Move to Morocco by cruise ship instead of cramped airplane. Stockpile rice and give it to poor people.
5. Name some places where you’ve lived.
Nouakchott (Mauritania), Chambery (France), Swansea (Wales), Three Hills (Alberta, Canada), Alturas (California, US), Bonney Lake (Washington, US), Tacoma, West Seattle, SE Portland, Tigard. (you should know where Seattle and Portland are)
6. Name some bad habits you have.
I am terminally disorganized and flaky. I have good intentions but then I forget to carry them out. I am hopeless at thank-you notes, follow-up phone calls, and other forms of adulthood. I spend too much time reading/on the computer.
7. Name some jobs you’ve had.
I worked at a Hallmark store in the Tacoma Mall during Christmas breaks from college, during which I was forced against my will to wear an apron that said “Santa’s Helper.” (Woman: Do you work here? Me: Would I be wearing this apron if I didn’t?) That was the only year I sent Christmas cards, so it wasn’t a complete loss (see number 6)
I cleaned houses in college–it paid well and the people I worked for were really nice. I also was a nanny for a while; pay was room, board, and use of a sweet little blue pick-up. Also, I loved the family I worked for.
8. Name those whom you are tagging.
You know, it’s gotten kind of hot here. Some time has passed since I started this; my sister-in-law is doing Spanish with the twins, who are going crazy because it’s 4 now, the time I said they could venture outside into the hot, hot sun. (They inherited my fair skin and light hair yet I could not convince them or my darker husband that even with sunscreen, people that look like us will burn if they go swimming at noon two days in a row) So I want to go swimming now and I don’t feel like tagging anyone. And, quite frankly, even though it means I’ve broken about 3 of the 4 rules, I can’t see what anyone is going to do to enforce it. Not tag me again? Ooooh. I’m quaking in my flip-flops here.