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January 2024 Prompts - Part 1
It continues to be easier for me to answer blog prompts monthly than it would be to write every day. This set of questions is from Spiffikins. I am just OCD-ish enough to fix the capitalization. By the way, I have another set of 2024 questions, which I will do soon.
1. What’s the coolest thing you’ve ever seen in nature? I have lots of candidates here - polar bears, waterfalls (especially Iguacu), the sand dunes at Sosusvlei in Namibia. And, of course, I’ve seen 5 total solar eclipses and two annular eclipses. But I think I have to put the aurora borealis at the top of my list.
2. Could you stop shopping for an entire year? I need to buy a certain amount of perishable food, so not really.
3. What national or international events that you lived through do you remember best? Some things which came to my mind are John Glenn orbitng the earth, JFK’s assassination, the moon landing, the American bicentennial, and 9/11.
4. Are your eating habits healthy? I try, but I don’t always do well. I get lazy about cooking and it’s too easy for me to go several days eating mostly things like cereal and quesadillas.
5. How do you fight the winter blues? Traveling to the Southern Hemisphere is the ideal way. Otherwise, I wallow in misery and hole up at home reading trashy novels.
6. Does technology make us more Alone? It can, but it can also bring us together. I know some great people who I first met on-line. And there are people I’ve known for years who have scattered to far-flung places and technology helps us stay in touch.
7. What are the most important changes, in your life and in the world, in the last decade? The COVID pandemic led to a lot of changes, both good and bad. I lost a few friends to the plague, for one thing. The rise of zoom has been a blessing in many ways.
8. How do you greet your friends and family? I tend to say, “hey, so-and-so,: where so-and-so is replaced by the person's name
9. Would you want to be a space tourist? There’s a part of me that would, but I also understand the risks. So I’d want to wait until I was old enough that I wouldn’t mind dying.
10. Do you trust your government? I trust the basic structure of our government but not all of the people in various positions of power.
11. How much do you think about your weight? Way too much for my mental health. My primary issue is that people treat weight as if it’s a moral issue, despite everything we know about how little control we actually have over it.
12. How much do you trust online reviews? I don’t trust anonymous reviews in general. However, it can be helpful to look at reviews and get an idea of how much consensus there is about them. I use, say, trip advisor that way, i.e. I care less about the actual review but about how consistent the comments various people make are.
13. How do you feel about zoos? I have mixed feelings. Some zoos have done excellent work at conservation for endangered species. But it still bothers me seeing animals in unnatural environments.
14. What could you not live without? What could you live without? I couldn’t live without oxygen, water, and at least some amount of control over the temperature of my environment. I could theoretically live without coffee, chocolate, books, and music, but I wouldn’t want to.
15. What are your experiences with severe weather? Shortly after we moved into the house I grew up in, there was a huge storm. For years I thought it had been a hurricane, but I now believe it was a nor’easter. As a three year old, I was not reassured when my father said to my mother, “If the house stands through this, Bea, I’ll know we made a good purchase.” I’ve lived through a handful of hurricanes and blizzards since then, with the blizzard of ’78 in Boston being particularly memorable. I also had the roof of a makeshift shelter fall on me during a cyclone when I was volunteering on an archaeological dig in Fiji in 2008.
16. How close are/were you to your parents? I got along okay with my parents (well, after my teenager years) but I didn’t spend a lot of time with them. I think that is partly because they encouraged my independence. In her later years, long after my father had died, I called my mother once a week to check up on her, but I only visited about once a year.
17. What are your favorite commercials? There was an Israeli GPS commercial a while back that involved Moses and the Israelites wandering in the desert until the burning bush gave him a GPS receiver. (I may not remember the details exactly, but that’s the gist of it.)
18. How well do you sleep? I usually fall asleep fairly easily, but I don’t stay asleep for more than four or five hours. If I go right back to sleep, I’ll be fine, but I can almost never resist just going and checking my email or doing a crossword or something else. And then I’m up for three or more hours before going back to sleep for a few hours.
19. What would you create if you had funding? Time is much more of an obstacle than money when it comes to my creative endeavors. However, there is a part of me that would still like to have the perfect house built. I went through a period in my early teens when I drew blueprints of houses a lot. This was sort of tied to an art class project we had in junior high, if I recall correctly.
20. What movies, shows or books do you wish had Sequels, spinoffs or new episodes? Less than a week ago, I would have mentioned my desire fsr a sequel to Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde. But there is one coming out in May!
21. Do you like scary movies and books? I can handle them, but I can only think of one book I found so frightening that it disturbed me for a significant amount of time. That was Harvest Home by Thomas Tryon. I do like several of Stephen King’s books, however, but they aren't the same level of psychological terror to me.
22. What are the best things you’ve acquired secondhand? I suppose things I’ve inherited don’t count. I’ve gotten a few things I like a lot at thrift shops, e.g. a straw handbag. And, of course, I have bought many books secondhand. Oh, I know! I have a lipstick holder in the shape of a doll that I found at a rummage sale when I was a teenager.
23. Do you believe that everything happens for a reason? Sort of. It’s just that sometimes the reason is that you’re an idiot.
24. Do you believe in intelligent alien ife? I know most people will disagree with me on this, but I believe the probability of life arising is so low that we are alone in the universe.
25. Have you ever felt pressured by family or others in making an important decision about your future? My parents sort of tried to pressure me at times, but I was good at smiling and nodding and then doing whatever the hell I pleased. Specifically, my mother wanted me to become a medical doctor.
26. Would you like to ride in a car that drives itself? I’m not confident enough in the technology yet to do that on city streets, but it might be fun in a controlled environment.
27. Do your television viewing habits include ‘binge-watching’? Yes. I don’t watch much television. But sometimes I do go through some series that is streaming somewhere and then I do tend to binge watch. I did that with Schmigadoon and Schmicago for example. And, going back bit further, I think I watched both seasons of Better Off Ted in just about a week. (If you have never seen it, it is the funniest show about corporate America ever.)
28. What’s Your Sunday routine? It depends on whether or not there is anything on my calendar as I sometimes have events (get-togethers with friends or theatre tickets or genealogy society meetings or one of my knitting groups) to go to on Sundays. Whether or not that’s the case, I normally start the day with breakfast and coffee and do my daily puzzles, with the addition of the Washington Post Sunday crossword. I actually think I could use more routine in my life and you may expect to read some of my thoughts about that in the future.
29. Have you ever interacted with the police? When I was growing up, one of our next door neighbors was a policeman. And I have a friend who is a cop, though not near me. But to answer what the question is really asking, I got pulled over for speeding once in Hawaii, though the cop let me off with a warning. And I once had a policeman knock on my door asking if I’d heard a gunshot.
30. Should prostitution be legal? I think sex work should be decriminalized but there have to be some protective regulations. At least a minimum age needs to be part of the picture. I’d add some sort of periodic health check requirement, too.
31. Do you worry a lot about germs? I worry some but not obsessively. Mostly, I try to take reasonable precautions, such as vaccinations, hand washing, masking, etc.
1. What’s the coolest thing you’ve ever seen in nature? I have lots of candidates here - polar bears, waterfalls (especially Iguacu), the sand dunes at Sosusvlei in Namibia. And, of course, I’ve seen 5 total solar eclipses and two annular eclipses. But I think I have to put the aurora borealis at the top of my list.
2. Could you stop shopping for an entire year? I need to buy a certain amount of perishable food, so not really.
3. What national or international events that you lived through do you remember best? Some things which came to my mind are John Glenn orbitng the earth, JFK’s assassination, the moon landing, the American bicentennial, and 9/11.
4. Are your eating habits healthy? I try, but I don’t always do well. I get lazy about cooking and it’s too easy for me to go several days eating mostly things like cereal and quesadillas.
5. How do you fight the winter blues? Traveling to the Southern Hemisphere is the ideal way. Otherwise, I wallow in misery and hole up at home reading trashy novels.
6. Does technology make us more Alone? It can, but it can also bring us together. I know some great people who I first met on-line. And there are people I’ve known for years who have scattered to far-flung places and technology helps us stay in touch.
7. What are the most important changes, in your life and in the world, in the last decade? The COVID pandemic led to a lot of changes, both good and bad. I lost a few friends to the plague, for one thing. The rise of zoom has been a blessing in many ways.
8. How do you greet your friends and family? I tend to say, “hey, so-and-so,: where so-and-so is replaced by the person's name
9. Would you want to be a space tourist? There’s a part of me that would, but I also understand the risks. So I’d want to wait until I was old enough that I wouldn’t mind dying.
10. Do you trust your government? I trust the basic structure of our government but not all of the people in various positions of power.
11. How much do you think about your weight? Way too much for my mental health. My primary issue is that people treat weight as if it’s a moral issue, despite everything we know about how little control we actually have over it.
12. How much do you trust online reviews? I don’t trust anonymous reviews in general. However, it can be helpful to look at reviews and get an idea of how much consensus there is about them. I use, say, trip advisor that way, i.e. I care less about the actual review but about how consistent the comments various people make are.
13. How do you feel about zoos? I have mixed feelings. Some zoos have done excellent work at conservation for endangered species. But it still bothers me seeing animals in unnatural environments.
14. What could you not live without? What could you live without? I couldn’t live without oxygen, water, and at least some amount of control over the temperature of my environment. I could theoretically live without coffee, chocolate, books, and music, but I wouldn’t want to.
15. What are your experiences with severe weather? Shortly after we moved into the house I grew up in, there was a huge storm. For years I thought it had been a hurricane, but I now believe it was a nor’easter. As a three year old, I was not reassured when my father said to my mother, “If the house stands through this, Bea, I’ll know we made a good purchase.” I’ve lived through a handful of hurricanes and blizzards since then, with the blizzard of ’78 in Boston being particularly memorable. I also had the roof of a makeshift shelter fall on me during a cyclone when I was volunteering on an archaeological dig in Fiji in 2008.
16. How close are/were you to your parents? I got along okay with my parents (well, after my teenager years) but I didn’t spend a lot of time with them. I think that is partly because they encouraged my independence. In her later years, long after my father had died, I called my mother once a week to check up on her, but I only visited about once a year.
17. What are your favorite commercials? There was an Israeli GPS commercial a while back that involved Moses and the Israelites wandering in the desert until the burning bush gave him a GPS receiver. (I may not remember the details exactly, but that’s the gist of it.)
18. How well do you sleep? I usually fall asleep fairly easily, but I don’t stay asleep for more than four or five hours. If I go right back to sleep, I’ll be fine, but I can almost never resist just going and checking my email or doing a crossword or something else. And then I’m up for three or more hours before going back to sleep for a few hours.
19. What would you create if you had funding? Time is much more of an obstacle than money when it comes to my creative endeavors. However, there is a part of me that would still like to have the perfect house built. I went through a period in my early teens when I drew blueprints of houses a lot. This was sort of tied to an art class project we had in junior high, if I recall correctly.
20. What movies, shows or books do you wish had Sequels, spinoffs or new episodes? Less than a week ago, I would have mentioned my desire fsr a sequel to Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde. But there is one coming out in May!
21. Do you like scary movies and books? I can handle them, but I can only think of one book I found so frightening that it disturbed me for a significant amount of time. That was Harvest Home by Thomas Tryon. I do like several of Stephen King’s books, however, but they aren't the same level of psychological terror to me.
22. What are the best things you’ve acquired secondhand? I suppose things I’ve inherited don’t count. I’ve gotten a few things I like a lot at thrift shops, e.g. a straw handbag. And, of course, I have bought many books secondhand. Oh, I know! I have a lipstick holder in the shape of a doll that I found at a rummage sale when I was a teenager.
23. Do you believe that everything happens for a reason? Sort of. It’s just that sometimes the reason is that you’re an idiot.
24. Do you believe in intelligent alien ife? I know most people will disagree with me on this, but I believe the probability of life arising is so low that we are alone in the universe.
25. Have you ever felt pressured by family or others in making an important decision about your future? My parents sort of tried to pressure me at times, but I was good at smiling and nodding and then doing whatever the hell I pleased. Specifically, my mother wanted me to become a medical doctor.
26. Would you like to ride in a car that drives itself? I’m not confident enough in the technology yet to do that on city streets, but it might be fun in a controlled environment.
27. Do your television viewing habits include ‘binge-watching’? Yes. I don’t watch much television. But sometimes I do go through some series that is streaming somewhere and then I do tend to binge watch. I did that with Schmigadoon and Schmicago for example. And, going back bit further, I think I watched both seasons of Better Off Ted in just about a week. (If you have never seen it, it is the funniest show about corporate America ever.)
28. What’s Your Sunday routine? It depends on whether or not there is anything on my calendar as I sometimes have events (get-togethers with friends or theatre tickets or genealogy society meetings or one of my knitting groups) to go to on Sundays. Whether or not that’s the case, I normally start the day with breakfast and coffee and do my daily puzzles, with the addition of the Washington Post Sunday crossword. I actually think I could use more routine in my life and you may expect to read some of my thoughts about that in the future.
29. Have you ever interacted with the police? When I was growing up, one of our next door neighbors was a policeman. And I have a friend who is a cop, though not near me. But to answer what the question is really asking, I got pulled over for speeding once in Hawaii, though the cop let me off with a warning. And I once had a policeman knock on my door asking if I’d heard a gunshot.
30. Should prostitution be legal? I think sex work should be decriminalized but there have to be some protective regulations. At least a minimum age needs to be part of the picture. I’d add some sort of periodic health check requirement, too.
31. Do you worry a lot about germs? I worry some but not obsessively. Mostly, I try to take reasonable precautions, such as vaccinations, hand washing, masking, etc.