The Liebster Award

Something like forever ago, I was nominated for an award by Chris up in Canada who blogs at Wisdom, Courage, Power.  I found his blog through Friend Making Mondays, which is a weekly series of questions posted by Kenlie, which sometimes leads to finding interesting blogs.  I've been following Chris's quest to do more ever since! 

It's taken me several months to pull together this post, mostly because I struggled to come up with my own questions at the end, but here goes! 

The Liebster Award

The nomination entails the following: 

 

Here is how the award works:

Each blogger posts 11 random facts about themselves.
Answer the questions the tagger has set for you
Choose 11 new bloggers to pass the award to/nominate
Come up with 11 new questions to ask your nominees
Go to their page and tell them about the award.
No tag backs!

11 Random Facts

1. I have officially lived in this condo in Dallas longer than I've lived anywhere else (within the last few months, it officially surpassed the home where I was born and lived for the first decade).
2. I get at least 7 hours of sleep almost every night (frequently closer to 8), but I have nearly perpetual dark circles under my eyes.  They seem to disappear only if I'm on vacation more than 10 days. 
3. I have three trips to Philly on the books for work in the next month (one settlement conference, one arbitration, and one mediation), and I am going to do my best to get out of every single one of them; I don't really enjoy traveling for work -- miss my husband and my running buddies too much.
4. I have a whole mess of brothers.  A vast majority of them asked our folks on more than one occasion if they could trade me in for a puppy -- they all resented my allergy to animals. 
5. I'm already pondering ideas for vacation in 2016, when I will get 3.5 weeks instead of 2.5 weeks of vacation time.  I'm a long-range planner by nature.  If they ever do an autopsy when I die, inside my chest cavity, near my heart, I think they will find a little "10 year at a glance" calendar.
6. My dream is for my husband to retire in about 10 years, and then for me to keep working at this job another 5 years after that, and then that we would move to Italy, but I could keep working full time in my current job (telecommuting permanently).  I would think it could work -- my hours would be odd, but the technology should be there for me to do everything except events I have to attend in person (see point 3 above), and I'm going to hopefully find a way to get someone else to cover those things. I've got 15 years to figure it out. 
7. I love to do impersonations of Edvard Munch's painting, The Scream.  I love trying to make my cheeks hollow and holding up my hands.  I have an oblong face, so it seems to work well.  Creeps my husband out. 
8. I keep clothing way too long.  I have items in my closet over 15 years old, and I'm still wearing them.  I don't like shopping, so my wardrobe rarely gets updated, and my tastes are pretty consistent, so I don't go much for fads.  I would love to keep about 15 pieces in my closet and just start over from scratch on the rest, but a combination of being cheap, being lazy, and hating shopping keeps me from doing that.  Thankfully, I seem to have clothes for all kinds of weight fluctuations. 
9. I had no problem watching basketball on tv with the last guy I dated before my husband, but now that I've been married for a few years to someone who doesn't watch sports on tv, I have essentially no tolerance or patience for it.  I am unbelievably uninterested in all professional sports except perhaps distance running. 
10. I am worried that someday I'll die of skin cancer.  I was not careful in my youth, and I'm a runner now -- I am much better about wearing sunscreen and not laying out (have never been to a tanning bed), but even runners who wear sunscreen have bad stats, let alone someone with my tanning history from junior high and high school.  And I'm not even 100% good with sunscreen now (Labor Day weekend was a good example). 
11. My other fear/prediction of dying involves being killed in a way that involves a train -- due to one real brush with death by train, and one perceived brush with death by train (and the perceived brush was considerably more frightening).

Chris's questions for his nominees:

1. What are you passionate about?  Seeing the world. I love to travel and experience places utterly new to me in every sense of the word, and I think the world would be a better place if more people were the same way.  I'm often surprised at home many people just aren't like that -- for example, a couple years ago, when a random Today Show viewer got to choose to go to any of the "where in the world is Matt Lauer" locations that had been featured that year, the choices to that point were Namibia, Madrid (Spain), Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), and the Swiss Alps.  The guy said he was going to choose Madrid, but then the final location that Matt went, the guy's final choice added to the list, was revealed to be Barbados, and he chose Barbados.  I would have picked Namibia in a heartbeat because it would be so costly to get there and it would be so different (I've already done KL, which could also be expensive.)  It just blew my mind that he'd choose somewhere so close and so not exotic when given so many distant and exotic options. 
2. What motivates you to get things done?  For things that I don't want to do (like listening to voicemails at work, paying bills online or by check), I try to remind myself of the consequences of not doing them, or consider what it would be like if I had to tell my boss that I hadn't listened to voicemail in X days (thankfully, I don't think he'd ever ask).  But fortunately, for most of my life these days, there isn't a lot of stuff that I do that I don't want to do.  When there's an occasional run I don't want to do or something, I just have to think about my long-term goals. 
3. What stops you from achieving your goals?   Hmm, good question!  When I think about goals, the main one I have right now is a certain marathon time in Berlin.  I haven't achieved it before because I haven't had strong enough training leading up to the race, and mentally, I've been content with something slower than my current goal time.  I want to change all of that this year and achieve that goal.  I also don't think I had enough experience at the marathon distance to have accomplished this goal much earlier. 
4. Batman or Superman (Human physical and mental greatness or Alien god-like powers)? Superman.  Love the idea of being faster than a speeding bullet and being able to fly anywhere without having to buy a plane ticket.   
5. Do you have pets?  No.  I have allergies to most things with fur or feathers, but even for something without either (or an allegedly hypo-allergenic version), I don't like the smell of pets or (more truthfully) the smell of pet food, and I don't like the idea of the responsibility (having to be home by a certain time to let it out, having to make arrangements to go out of town for a week).  And I have another series of ethical questions about owning a living creature for my own enjoyment, and the idea of having to possibly feed it meat/dead animals.  But my husband is the opposite.  While I'm somewhat afraid of animals I don't know, he has never met one he doesn't like.  He loves petting animals, and I think if I died, one of the first things he'd do would be to get a pet -- he loves dogs and cats particularly. 
6. If you could travel anywhere for relaxation or excitement where and what would it be? Right now, I'd choose to bring peace and stability to Egypt and choose to go there.  I think it would be the perfect blend of excitement, sights, history, culture, and then hit a resort for the relaxation on the sea for a few days. 
7. What is your favourite movie and why?  My favorite movie is Jerry Maguire, mostly because I love the message of there being more to a professional life than money (remember, I hung in big law until I truly got to the $hit-or-get-off-the-pot point).  There's a lot about the movie's message that resonates with me. 
8. Would you use a time machine to alter your past? Knowing that any changes made could completely change your life/knowledge/personality now?  Ooh, yes, I have done several things that I would love to go back and change.  Hopefully it would also change the life/knowledge/personality of the people that I had hurt or wronged in my past.  I'd also like to make healthier choices (like wearing sunscreen).  Not sure I'd go back and change my food choices (some of it tasted so goooood), but I'd like to have started regular exercise earlier than I did. 
9. What’s your all time favourite band?  Aerosmith.
10. What makes a good friend? Having something in common, being reliable (someone who flakes out on plans, no matter how sweet, quickly gets written off in my book), being loyal and understanding, being a good listener, generally being caring and compassionate.   
11. Why do you blog?  Blogging has replaced the journals of my childhood and adolescence.  I like that it forces me sometimes to identify and focus on a goal, and I like having the chronological record of my past.  And of course it's fun to feel like others might give a crap about my daily life and thoughts! 

My Questions for My Nominees:

1. What is the most exotic place you'd like to visit that you've never been? Why do you consider it exotic and do you think you'll ever go?
2. What is your favorite nonfiction book of all time?  And your favorite fiction book?
3. If you had a time machine, when and where would you want to go first?  Let's assume that you can't be killed while you're there, so wars, dinosaurs, whatever, no danger. 
4. If you had one month to spend at home with no work or family obligations to occupy your time, what all would you plan to do? 
5. If you have siblings, do you think your parents have a favorite among you?  Are you the favorite?  And do you believe in birth order personality stuff (which also applies to people without siblings)? 
6. What is your number one goal to accomplish in 2013? 
7. If you were given a $1,000 gift card tomorrow, what would you buy with it? 
8. Who is someone you look up to and who has greatly influenced your life, but you have never met in person? 
9. When is the last time you were awake at 3 a.m. that you can remember, and were you doing something you can share?
10. How old is the oldest piece of clothing you own and still wear with some regularity, and what is it? 
11. Which category do you fit in regarding fundraisers at work or brought to your door at home:  a.) you're the one seeking the contributions (for your own charity or for something for your kids), b.) you usually buy something, c.) you rarely buy anything?  And what do you think of those fundraiser sale forms in the office in general?  (Bonus question, can you guess what I got in my work in-box this morning?  Haha, it was wrapping paper sales for someone's kid.) 

My Award Nominees:

1. http://bellaonthebeach.wordpress.com/
2. http://amazinginmotion.wordpress.com/
3. http://26point2ers.blogspot.com/ 
4. http://healthylivinginthecity.com/
5. http://theredheadedrunner.blogspot.com/
6. http://therunningjewess.wordpress.com/
7. http://www.gracedishes.com/
8. http://insecurechubbygirl.blogspot.com/
9. http://fromthekitchentotheroad.wordpress.com/
10. http://mybizzykitchen.com/
11. http://ashley-to-awesome.blogspot.com/