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November Prompts
Dec. 3rd, 2021 02:08 pm1. Have you ever been caught outdoors away from shelter during a thunderstorm? More than once. I remind myself that people are, more or less, waterproof.
2. Did you ever build furniture forts as a child? I don’t think so. I used to hide inside my quilt cover, however.
3. Do you use any medicines daily? Yes. The joy of being middle-aged.
4. When was the last time you used a disposable camera? I had a disposable underwater camera with me while snorkeling a couple of times. I never remembered how to use it quickly enough when I saw something worth photographing, however. At any rate, it’s been several years.
5. When was the last time you flew on a plane? August, when I flew back from Chicago.
6. How many first cousins do you have? That’s a bit complicated. I have two on my mother’s side, who I am slightly in tough with. But I know one of my father’s half-sisters has at least two children, though I haven’t met them. I suppose it’s possible that the other half-sister does, but she and my father were estranged my entire life.
7. What’s the longest period of time you’ve gone without sleep? About 56 hours. It had to do with completing the final project for a robotics seminar I took in grad school. I am never going to do that to myself again.
8. Did the house you grew up in have a big yard? It wasn’t a huge yard, but it was big enough for us to have an above-ground swimming pool and a patio in the back. And big enough for us to use the front yard as a (non-regulation size) softball diamond.
9. What has been the most difficult class you’ve ever taken? Probably the graduate acoustics class I took as an undergraduate. I really needed to have had a continuum mechanics class before that. If nothing else, that would have helped me with notation I didn’t understand.
10. What’s something that’s much more difficult than a lot of people realize? House cleaning.
11. What are some things a house would need to have for you to purchase it? Rooms that are more or less rectangular. Before I bought my condo, I can’t count how many condos I looked at that had weird shaped rooms, which it would be hard to arrange furniture in.
12. Would you ever go out in public wearing pajamas? Maybe to take out the trash or take in mail, but not more than that.
13. Have you ever had a lemonade stand? No.
14. Do you think you look older or younger than your real age? I think I look about my age. My skin looks younger, but I have grey hair, so things balance out.
15. Where have you lived throughout your life? I was born in the Bronx. Grew up on Long Island, with summers in upstate New York, New Hampshire, and Connecticut. Went to college in Massachusetts and grad school in Berkeley. Then lived in Los Angeles for 17 years before moving to Northern Virginia almost 20 years ago.
16. Do you want any piercings? No. About the time that many of my friends were getting their ears pierced, I read Louisa May Alcott’s Eight Cousins. The main character’s uncle tells her that if she gets her ears pierced, she has to get her nose pierced, too. He didn’t follow through on that, but it freaked me out enough that I never even got my ears pierced.
17. What’s your mouse pad look like? I haven’t used a mousepad in years, but I have one with Bugs Bunny on it.
18. Have you ever been to a psychic/tarot reader? No, though as a teenager, my friends and I played around with fortune telling with an ordinary deck of cards and a little book that cost about a quarter we used to interpret the results.
19. How do you identify spiritually (do you follow a religion, what do you think about soul/spirit, etc.)? I’m Jewish and, generally, like traditional Jewish philosophy and practices.
20. Do you prefer your nails long or short? Having been the victim of the aggressive fingernail clipping of a piano teacher, I keep my nails short. When want them long for some special occasion, I wear Lee press-on nails.
21. What are your favorite smells? Sea air. Bread baking. Cinnamon. Coffee. Lily of the Valley.
22. Do you still use a radio or just use your phone/computer for music? How do you count listening to radio stations on the computer? I do also listen to the radio in the car.
23. What kind of socks do you prefer to wear? I am partial to double layer walking socks.
24. Do you have any family heirlooms? I have a necklace which my great-grandmother allegedly bought in Shanghai. I haven’t found any evidence that she actually ever went to Shanghai, so that story seems dubious, but I do like the necklace.
25. Are there any musicians you didn't like at first but grew on you? Lady Gaga.
26. Is there anything you used to love but now dislike? There are some foods I ate as a child that I gag at the mere thought of now - soft-boiled eggs and bananas with sour cream (and, frankly, bananas in any form) are two that come to mind.
27. Your favorite place to be aside from your home? This is tough. Maybe, by the ocean.
28. What is your favorite kind of tea? Lapsang souchong.
29. Any old home remedies you use when you're sick? Jewish penicillin, i.e. chicken soup.
30. What level of brightness do you usually keep your phone at? Right around the middle.
2. Did you ever build furniture forts as a child? I don’t think so. I used to hide inside my quilt cover, however.
3. Do you use any medicines daily? Yes. The joy of being middle-aged.
4. When was the last time you used a disposable camera? I had a disposable underwater camera with me while snorkeling a couple of times. I never remembered how to use it quickly enough when I saw something worth photographing, however. At any rate, it’s been several years.
5. When was the last time you flew on a plane? August, when I flew back from Chicago.
6. How many first cousins do you have? That’s a bit complicated. I have two on my mother’s side, who I am slightly in tough with. But I know one of my father’s half-sisters has at least two children, though I haven’t met them. I suppose it’s possible that the other half-sister does, but she and my father were estranged my entire life.
7. What’s the longest period of time you’ve gone without sleep? About 56 hours. It had to do with completing the final project for a robotics seminar I took in grad school. I am never going to do that to myself again.
8. Did the house you grew up in have a big yard? It wasn’t a huge yard, but it was big enough for us to have an above-ground swimming pool and a patio in the back. And big enough for us to use the front yard as a (non-regulation size) softball diamond.
9. What has been the most difficult class you’ve ever taken? Probably the graduate acoustics class I took as an undergraduate. I really needed to have had a continuum mechanics class before that. If nothing else, that would have helped me with notation I didn’t understand.
10. What’s something that’s much more difficult than a lot of people realize? House cleaning.
11. What are some things a house would need to have for you to purchase it? Rooms that are more or less rectangular. Before I bought my condo, I can’t count how many condos I looked at that had weird shaped rooms, which it would be hard to arrange furniture in.
12. Would you ever go out in public wearing pajamas? Maybe to take out the trash or take in mail, but not more than that.
13. Have you ever had a lemonade stand? No.
14. Do you think you look older or younger than your real age? I think I look about my age. My skin looks younger, but I have grey hair, so things balance out.
15. Where have you lived throughout your life? I was born in the Bronx. Grew up on Long Island, with summers in upstate New York, New Hampshire, and Connecticut. Went to college in Massachusetts and grad school in Berkeley. Then lived in Los Angeles for 17 years before moving to Northern Virginia almost 20 years ago.
16. Do you want any piercings? No. About the time that many of my friends were getting their ears pierced, I read Louisa May Alcott’s Eight Cousins. The main character’s uncle tells her that if she gets her ears pierced, she has to get her nose pierced, too. He didn’t follow through on that, but it freaked me out enough that I never even got my ears pierced.
17. What’s your mouse pad look like? I haven’t used a mousepad in years, but I have one with Bugs Bunny on it.
18. Have you ever been to a psychic/tarot reader? No, though as a teenager, my friends and I played around with fortune telling with an ordinary deck of cards and a little book that cost about a quarter we used to interpret the results.
19. How do you identify spiritually (do you follow a religion, what do you think about soul/spirit, etc.)? I’m Jewish and, generally, like traditional Jewish philosophy and practices.
20. Do you prefer your nails long or short? Having been the victim of the aggressive fingernail clipping of a piano teacher, I keep my nails short. When want them long for some special occasion, I wear Lee press-on nails.
21. What are your favorite smells? Sea air. Bread baking. Cinnamon. Coffee. Lily of the Valley.
22. Do you still use a radio or just use your phone/computer for music? How do you count listening to radio stations on the computer? I do also listen to the radio in the car.
23. What kind of socks do you prefer to wear? I am partial to double layer walking socks.
24. Do you have any family heirlooms? I have a necklace which my great-grandmother allegedly bought in Shanghai. I haven’t found any evidence that she actually ever went to Shanghai, so that story seems dubious, but I do like the necklace.
25. Are there any musicians you didn't like at first but grew on you? Lady Gaga.
26. Is there anything you used to love but now dislike? There are some foods I ate as a child that I gag at the mere thought of now - soft-boiled eggs and bananas with sour cream (and, frankly, bananas in any form) are two that come to mind.
27. Your favorite place to be aside from your home? This is tough. Maybe, by the ocean.
28. What is your favorite kind of tea? Lapsang souchong.
29. Any old home remedies you use when you're sick? Jewish penicillin, i.e. chicken soup.
30. What level of brightness do you usually keep your phone at? Right around the middle.
