I needed some blogging ideas so I asked Alissa to interview me.

Thanks, Alissa, this was fun!

1. In honor of your upcoming vacation to Jamaica, what has been your most memorable vacation so far?
It’s hard to pick just one! Of course, our honeymoon taught us the wonders of all-inclusive vacations! Every one we’ve been on has been fantastic. However, one stands out …

Our trip to Playa del Carmen, Mexico, was rather unusual. They were filming Celebrity Mole at the resort (of those in the cast, we saw Angie Everhart, Dennis Rodman, Mark Curry, and Corbin Bernsen. Corbin was wearing short-shorts.)

There would be random restaurant closures (without notice, or, maybe they posted something in the lobby which was really far from our room!). Some parts of the resort were off-limits. The folks in the room next to us must have been on crew, and would leave their rooms early in the morning without turning off their alarm, which was set at 5am. After calling the front desk someone came and shut it off … but hit SNOOZE! This happened more than one day.

2. What is your earliest childhood memory?
My earliest memory clips aren’t the most exciting …

I remember lying in my crib looking at the animal wallpaper, crying. I must have just woke up, and as I lay there I remember thinking I didn’t know why I was crying, but I kept crying anyway.

I also remember standing in the doorway of a kitchen, looking up at an old woman who had the refrigerator door open. I asked my mom about this once, and she wasn’t sure who it was, it could have been either my great-grandmother or great-aunt.

This was a little later, but I remember in nursery school, I saw my friend’s show-and-tell toy before show-and-tell, and she wanted me to forget what she brought. I told her I did, but I still remember it was a play sewing kit.

3. If reincarnation exists, what animal would you like to come back as and why?
A cat. All they have to do is eat, sleep, play and cuddle. It’s too tough being a stray, so I’d want a nice family, of course!

4. If you had to choose between never being able to turn off the TV or never being able to watch TV again, what would you choose?
I’m a TV junkie. It’d have to stay on all the time! (I can always tune it out if nothing is on!)

I can change the channels, right?

5. What advice can you give me regarding my upcoming wedding/marriage?
If you’re looking to learn from my mistakes 🙂 …

For the wedding itself:
1) Whenever possible, prepare things ahead of time.

I should have prepared checks for all the vendors, but instead just grabbed my checkbook (which was on the last check!). Good thing hubby was staying at our apartment the night before and could grab a new book. He was stuck paying people, when I had had all the info with me … oh well!

I also saved the seating chart until the last minute (I knew where people were sitting, but hadn’t created the map for the hotel). We wound up with two tables in the wrong place (an 8-person table was swapped with a 10-person table), so some family members switched table numbers and/or rearranged themselves. The staff did set up another table for some reason. My in-laws ended up being mixed in with my family.

2) Thinks will go wrong. Don’t let them stress you out!
As long as you are married at the end of the day, it was a success!

And for marriage?
It seems every relationship is different, so there are going to be many paths to a successful marriage.

My husband thanks me all the time when he sees our friends’ wives nagging/controlling their husbands … I don’t know, nagging doesn’t seem to be the way to go!

Remember that you are individuals, and getting married doesn’t change that. For me, we lived together for four years first, so really, the only changes after the wedding were my last name, a ring on my finger, and being able to file joint taxes!

Wanna participate? The “rules”…
1. Leave me a comment saying, “Interview me.”
2. I will respond by e-mailing you five questions. I get to pick them, and you have to answer them all.
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Or maybe a conundrum. Or a hodgepodge. (My husband gets credit for reminding me of this commercial, of course, now he has also compared me to a platypus.)

It crossed my mind last night, as I was getting ready for bed, that my hair falls somewhere between wavy and curly.

It has too much curl to be wavy, but the weight of my hair tends to straighten the curls somewhat, so that it’s not really curly either. It just gets frizzy/fluffy if I don’t use the right products!

And then there’s the color. A friend once described me as a “rotten strawberry blond.” That’s probably the best way to put it! I’m too dark to be strawberry blond, not red enough to be a redhead. I’d like it to be redder, but I won’t dye it*. I love that it’s natural.

So we’ve got sort of curly reddish-blondish-brownish hair.

Adding to the mix, I am also a tall petite. At 5’3″, I’m still pretty short. The “petite” category is supposed to be for people 5’4″ and under so I should be fine. However, I have a terrible time finding pants with the right length.

Most of the time, petite pants are too short. They are usually the perfect length, if I were to go barefoot. That rules out even the smallest heel most of the time. Non-petite pants tend to be longer than my highest heels.

I’m not a good enough sewer to hem nice pants (I’ll only hem pajamas or running pants!), and I’m not going to have all of my clothes tailored, so I’ll just keep trying on dozens of pants, waiting for the ones that have a slightly longer (or shorter) inseam!

So, I’m kind of short, with sort of curly reddish-blondish-brownish hair. And blueish-greenish-grayish eyes.

No complaints there. They change color to match my outfits!

*Not that my hair has never been dyed … in college, it was deeper red, dark brown, reddish-pink, and purple. It’s all mine now — no dye has touched my head since 1996!

Because Cecily asked, here are five things you don’t know about me:

1. I sleep with my eyes open.
   Really creepy, huh? The first time my husband realized it, we were not even dating yet. A group of us from college went on a road trip, and we all crashed in one friend’s parents’ living room. They let me have the couch, everyone else was arranged on the floor or in chairs.

   In the morning, some of them woke up before me, but they thought I was awake and started talking to me. When I did not respond, they waved their hands in front of my face, and realized I was actually not awake. Just a freak.

   I now warn people if I’m ever sharing a hotel room, or if there is the possibility I may doze off (long car ride).

2. I used to be in a band.
   Two bands, actually. In college, I got a microphone I could tack to my violin, and joined some friends’ rock band. We played out in bars a few times, but disbanded after 1/2 of the band graduated.

   A few years after college, I joined some people I found looking for bandmates in a local paper. I played some keyboards, some violin, and backing vocals. It never really went anywhere — it was a never-ending search to complete the lineup — but it was fun writing/recording songs.

3. People think I’m quiet, until they get to know me.
   Especially in groups, I take a little while to open up. I guess I don’t like to compete if there are lots of people talking. I can be a little shy, but usually it’s more that I need to warm up to new people/situations. Once I start to break down into smaller groups or one-on-one, I won’t shut up. Anybody who thinks I am quiet doesn’t really know me.
4. I am kind of a dork.
   Just this morning, I took out a tape measure so I could draw up a reasonably to-scale floor plan of my new office onto graph paper. That way, I can cut out miniature desks, bookcases and file cabinets and rearrange them. I currently don’t have an officemate, but I will soon, so I want to make sure it’s just right!

   I’m sure there are plenty of other dorky examples, I will add more if I think of any!

5. I am a vegetarian.
   Well, more accurately, a pescetarian, but it’s usually easier to say vegetarian.

   Still, my convictions aren’t really that strong. I stopped eating meat in college because cafeteria meat was gross, and I had a lot of vegetarian friends so it was easy to go along. Now, 13 or so years later, a lot of it is habit. They make lots of yummy fake meat products now, too.

   I still wear leather, but fur is too “dead animal” for me.

There you have it!

I had perfect attendance in high school.

Actually, I think it started in sixth grade and lasted through graduation. That is seven years of school without missing a full day.

Technically, I did go to the beach on senior cut day, but the award notices had already gone out.

I almost went to school that day because of the perfect attendance thing, though. I would have been there alone, aside from the few people who wouldn’t graduate if they missed any more gym classes.

Most definitely, this has molded me to be the person I am today. I wonder how many years into the trend it took to make me drag myself to school with a fever so that I could perform in the high school musical that night? They certainly would have missed third girl from the left …

I am a rule-follower. I will be where I am supposed to be. I keep my promises. I precisely measure when baking. (I’m not sure if that one is related, but I am very particular, even when mixing margaritas. Even if it’s the fifth pitcher of margaritas!)

It really bothered me when I had to miss a Messiah concert, and it just hit me that this must be related to my perfect attendance complex. (I did let illness pull me from a concert in college as well, I had bad cold or the flu. But I tried to perform. I went to the pre-concert rehearsal dressed in my concert uniform black and white, only to realize I felt dizzy every time we stood up and didn’t think I could make it through.)

I fortunately do take vacations from work without feeling guilty, apparently my mind can process that I have vacation time and I should use it. I’m still working on the sick days, though. I’ve only taken a handful in over six years of working with my current employer. But I have taken them! No more perfect attendance!

Now, let’s see … I’ve posted for 64 days in a row. Is this becoming a problem?