Of memes and being tagged.

I've been tagged. Not in the elementary playground sense of the word "tag" but in the meme sense. A meme (rhymes with team) is a passing of cultural information, practice, or idea through rote from one person to another. Kind of like a chain letter - but less annoying. Memes are a cousin to the bulletins on myspace, but unlike the myspace bulletins, memes are individually assigned and do not end with the phrase "re-post this with in the next five minutes or else..."

For the most part I ignore those silly myspace surveys. Most of them were obviously invented by some one not yet old enough to have a myspace account. And I've made it a policy to never re-post the ones I do read.

I've never done a meme on this blog, but there is a first for everything, right? And I was tagged. Not just tagged by some random person, but by Sam the Reporter, a U of I journalism grad and seemingly cool guy. So I thought I'd participate.

Here's the "rules" of this meme: Each player starts with 7 random facts/habits about themselves. People who are tagged need to write on their own blog about their seven things, as well as these rules.



1. I believe that everybody has some obsessive-compulsive tendencies. I have many. One of mine has to do with public restrooms. Like a good citizen, I always wash my hands when I use a public restroom. There is nothing OCD about that. However, once I have washed my hands, I can not exit the public restroom until my hands are completely dry. The strange part about this obsessive compulsion: I do not have the same tendency at home. I have no problem leaving my bathroom at home with washed yet un-dried hands.

2. I all ready know which two songs that I would like played (or performed) at my funeral: Steve Taylor’s “The Finish Line” and Pep Squad’s “On That Day.” In case you are wondering, I am not planning on having my funeral anytime soon. I am only planning ahead – hopefully WAY ahead.

3. I can go for days listening to nothing but hip-hop. That wasn’t always the case. In 1992, I was a junior-high student living in the suburbs of Seattle; naturally, I was into grunge. Many of my friends considered it blasphemy to not be a fan of Nirvana, Alice in Chains, and Pearl Jam. As a grunge-baby, I despised rap music – a trend that was shared with my father who also hated rap. Yet, the older I get, the more I relate to hip-hop. There is something about the prose, the beat, and the awkward lyrical disparity between self-conscious vulnerability and self-confident swagger that resonates with in me. Ten years ago, I did not own any rap music; hip-hop now dominates of at least 50% of my music collection.

4. While my wife was pregnant, I gained as much weight as she did. She has since lost that weight. I have not.

5. I used to be a DJ; I provided entertainment for wedding receptions, company parties, school dances and whatever other type of gig my boss would send me to. Interestingly, high-school dances were my favorite gigs. One of my least favorite gigs was a wedding reception in golf course club house with no air conditioning… temperatures and humidity both in the high 90’s. I also DJ’d for a reception during a severe storm. While the bride and groom were cutting the cake, I was outside watching a tornado touch down remarkably close to the reception hall.

6. I don’t have any piercings – not because I am opposed to them – I just don’t like needles. I had a bad experience. This strong aversion to needles has prevented me from getting my ears pierced, but it did not prevent me from getting a tattoo.

7. Many of the things I enjoy most are things that I did not enjoy in my youth. To begin, there is my previously mentioned love for hip-hop music. When I was in high school, I hated writing and avoided it at all costs. Now, I am constantly writing. Writing is one of my passions – be it my blogs, my slow coming novel, letters and essays, and my work for school. I would have never pictured myself teaching classes, or at least enjoying teaching. Now that I am teaching, I enjoy it beyond anything I ever imagined doing. And numbers. Math was not my strongest subject when I was in high school – still isn’t my strongest subject. That lack of math skills prohibited me from pursuing a career as an architect, by my analytical personality has driven a fascination with numbers. I enjoy creating spreadsheets. I like details, statistics, metrics, trending, etc. I like all of the reporting aspects of the corporate world that no one else wants to do, but needs to get done.