Seventeen items

Thansk to Alex. Here goes:

1. Ten years ago: I was about to begin my senior year at FIU, and about to begin the slimming process which, if my luck holds out, continues to this day.

2. Five years ago: I was beginning the second leg of my reporting internshiph at the Ft Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel. Boy, was I unhappy. I realized within a week that I was a better liar and fabulist than a reporter. To quote Ronald Reagan: "Facts are stupid things."

3. One year ago: A day much like this one: I drove to FIU's Biscayne Bay campus (no bus between semesters), where I read stories all day while stealing minutes to work on a Stylus article.

4. Yesterday: I awoke at ten-thirty after going to bed at an ungodly hour. I visited my parents, my grandmother, and then came home to exercise, finish watching Sidney Lumet's adaptation Long Day's Journey Into Night (Katherine Hepburn must be seen to be believed), cooked pork chops and couscous, worked on a short story, and went to bed at ten-thirty, exactly twelve hours after awakening.

5. Today: Work, got home early.

6. Tomorrow: Work. I'll probably watch Broken Flowers or hang out with Frank.

7. Five snacks I enjoy: Manchego cheese, coffee, apples, sugar cookies....er, help me out. I don't really snack....

8. Five bands whose lyrics I know: Beatles, A Tribe Called Quest, Roxy Music, Liz Phair, R.E.M.

9. Five things I would do with $100,000,000: Pay my mortgage, foot the bill for my sister's wedding, smile a lot, improve my wine collection, and bribe the staff of The New Yorker into publishing my stories.

10. Five locations I'd like to run away to [anyone checking the grammar of these questions?]: London, Chicago, Edinburgh. When I win that $100,000,000, I'll answer this question properly.

11. Five Bad Habits: Pursuing a joke to the bitter end, arrogance, preferring my own company to anyone else's, smoking, drinking gin instead of vodka (the hangovers are getting vicious).

12. Five things I like doing: Working, fabulizing, observing, spending money on good food and wine, and listening to De La Soul's singles collection on State Road 836.

13. Five TV shows I like: Umm....ABC's "World News Tonight With Peter Jennings" [R.I.P].

14. Famous People I'd like to meet, living or dead: Famous people are boring (see Bad Habit #3).

15. Biggest joys at the moment: Owning my own apartment.

16. Favorite toys: My new lighter and that hairy beast between my legs.

17. Five people to tag, chosen quite at random: Vic, Ian, Johnny, Thomas, Apa.