Recipient of the Stylish Blogger Award: Your reward? Seven Random Facts You Could Probably Live the Rest of Your Life Without Knowing

(Font changed. The other one was bugging my eyeballs out of my head. Ah, hyperbole, thy name is Jenn...)

I suck at this blogging stuff. It's okay. You don't have to tell me, or hint that maybe I should write more often. I just can't think of stuff to blog about. I'm not like Keyboard Hussy, aka, Evelyn Lafont, who's all brave and smarty-pants and always has cool stuff to say. I'm not like Janice Hardy or even JA Konrath who write frequently with all sorts of helpful wisdom. I couldn't give advice to a troll, unless it was "use a condom." That about sums up a life's worth of experiences and missed opportunities. I could ramble on more about grammar but there are folks out there (GrammarGirl) who have WAY bigger brains, who offer WAY better advice than I do. What if I'm wrong? What if you use something incorrectly after listening to my words, and then your editor comes back and tells you you're a loser? Omigod, I don't think I could handle the guilt. (Although, I must say, I'm rarely wrong. Ever, in fact. FINE, okay, sometimes I'm wrong. Shut up.)

IMAGINE my surprise when blogger and friend Kara over at Great Imaginations nominated me for this:

 It means less about me being stylish (seriously, mom jeans and T-shirts? Someone get Par-eeee on the line!), and more about me being invited to play a game with some other interesting humans. Only thing is, I'm just not feeling clever. Maybe my hormones are out of whack. Maybe I need some chocolate. (Oh. Wait. I just had some. That's not it.) Maybe...omigod, maybe I'm running out of words. Does that happen? Does that happen? 

Regardless, here are the rules:

1. Thank and link the person who nominated you. THANK YOU, KARA! (Brat.) 

2. Share seven random facts about yourself. Below.

3. Pass the award on to five new-found blogging buddies. Not gonna do this one. Everyone I would've chosen already has done it or would be annoyed with me because they have Important Things to blog about. If YOU want to do it, then I nominate you. Leave a comment so I can see your answers.

4. Contact the winners to congratulate them. See #3 above. Congratulations, WINNERS! (Huh?)

Okay, on with the show -- seven (7) random facts about Jenn. Geeze, guys. Sorry in advance. 

1. When I was a kid, my mom used to call me Linus (from the Peanuts Gang, not like Linus Pauling because I was a genius or anything). She also used to call me Eeyore for reasons that should be obvious to you at this point, but we're not talking about that. She, and others in my life, have called me Linus for years because I...have a blanket. Yes. A blanket. A blankie, a wompy, and sleep-sleep, whatever the hell your kids/younger siblings have called it, I got one. I'm on maybe the 20th incarnation of my blanket habit, though I still have the very first one that was mine when I was a baby. What are the necessary requirements in order for a piece of cloth to be The Blanket? Must be that soft woven yarny fabric with SATIN AROUND THE EDGES. It's called "coldy," because when the satin gets cold, I fondle it in a way that has made many men jealous. I love satin. Especially when it's cold. I am often wrapped in said blanket, like a burqa of my own making, on any given weekend day and every weekday night. When it's cold outside, the satin is cold. Life complete. Turn the damn heat down, or the satin will be too warm. Now that you know this about me, I'll have to kill someone close to you with my bare, satiny hands.

2. I effing HATE broccoli. I hate it. HATE IT. My kids often try to talk me into eating tiny bunches of this treelike abomination. They will pose questions such as: "If someone had a gun to your head and said, 'Eat the broccoli or die,' what would you do?" My answer: "Pull the trigger now, bitch."

3. When I was in high school, I was a competitive ROLLER skater. Yes. Roller. We did all the same shit the ice skaters did -- jumps, spins, figures -- only with about 3 lb. of skate on each foot. I had killer legs when I was 15. My coach was Tonya Harding's uncle. Yes that Tonya Harding. But Bob was great. He never chased me down with a metal bar. The roller skaters were sort of the white trash of the skating community. Sure, there were a few skaters who came from wealthy families and were stupid-talented athletes and performers (including this one guy visiting our rink who pulled a quad before the ice skaters were doing it--a QUAD. That's FOUR revolutions in the air!). But I never quite got why they weren't ice skating instead. It was so much...cooler. Like Nordstrom vs. KMart. Roller rinks of the '80s still had that reputation. (You know the one I'm talking about.) Like ice, roller was an expensive sport, though roller didn't have near the prestige of its icey compatriot, probably because it lacks the grace and silence of ice. Wheels scraping and screeching on wood and/or blue plastic floors is annoying and breaks the moment. It's like watching hippos dance. Gassy hippos. Too clunky. Sorry if you were a roller skater, but that's how it looked to me. Anyway, I did okay during the short time I was training. I only competed in a single meet, for figures. (It's a lot harder than it looks.) Then my six-day-a week practice schedule became a burden for my family, so I had to quit. It sucked. I haven't really skated since, other than that time I took my little sister to the rink in Centralia, Washington, and she participated in one of those races they do during family skate sessions. Ash won her age group (in roller blades...ahhh, the times, they were a'changin'...) but then tripped at the finish line and broke her wrist. GREAT SISTER I am. I still have dreams about being on skates, ice or roller, and pulling off that perfect triple axel. (For the record, I never nailed the single. I'm ambitious in the Dream State.)

4. I love ducks. All ducks. I collect rubber ducks, and my favorite are two that were given to me at Christmas -- you've seen them before (Jovie and Zuzu). I'll include the photo here, in case you haven't seen it before on the blog or on Facebook. I am married to someone who builds miniatures and models for movies, and we are just dorky enough that we have been known to tear the house apart to build small-scale set-ups for whatever random idea we've had, so I can photograph our blaze of insanity genius. You should see the looks the neighbors give me when I am lying on the grass, taking photographs of a rubber duck wearing a red wig. (BTW, Build-A-Bear has great outfits for my ducks. Just sayin'...) If you're ever out shopping and you see an amazing rubber duck, think of me.

5. I am a terrible cook. And I'm lazy. Because of that, I put out minimum effort to keep my body nourished during the week when my husband/children aren't home to make sure I have food. I tend to follow lazy trends with vessels of nutrients, i.e., I get on a kick with something that takes the shakies away, and then I eat it at the same time everyday. Right now, it's those crunchy Nature Valley-only-generic-store-brand granola bars (the peanut butter ones). In the afternoon, I will have an open-faced peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I don't want the two sides to touch. Oh, and I don't drink it much because it's bad for me, but I do love me some diet Coke, and sometimes I will sneak to the corner store and buy one and feel very guilty because I know it has that bad chemical that starts with a P and can cause Alzheimer's or impotence or gout or blindness or something bad in lab rats when given at 1,000 times the potency.

6. I love doughnuts. Well, and sugar. Anything with sugar, I will eat. Except broccoli. You can dip that shit in chocolate and gold, and I still will not eat it. Not in a house, not with a mouse, not in a boat, not with a goat...

7. I have an outy belly button after having an umbilical hernia repair surgery as an infant. The doctor allegedly came out mid-surgery to tell my mom I was fine, and asked if she wanted them to reattach my belly button. Thankfully, she said yes. But bikini beautiful, it ain't (except for that one summer in LA...hmmm...the only time have ever looked hot in a bikini...divorce diets are the BEST!). And no, I will not show you the belly button if you ask. I won't post a photo or flash it to you on Skype. The older I get, the more "inny" it gets, but that's because I eat too much of #6 above.

So there you have it. Kara, did I do it right? Thanks, babe. That was sorta...fun. And now that the list is over and stunted at 7 items, a hundred other random things will come to me because that's how my brain works. Like molasses: slow to get started but then all thick and runny once it's warmed up.

Last but not least: I've rearranged some "furniture" this weekend. Watch for the reveal, with pictures, this week.

Xs and Os...