deep breath.....here goes

10 years ago: blow-drying my waist-length hair, trying to get it to do that four-inch-high bang thing like Elaine from Seinfeld, while trying to read the driver's ed manual in preparation for my learner's test and figuring out what to wear for the first day of grade 11. The silk shirt and pleated jeans? The stirrup pants/pirate shirt/embroidered vest combo? How does one decide? Oh god.

5 years ago: blow-drying my shoulder-length hair after washing it to get the smell of Red Lobster out post-working a 10 hour "split" serving shift where not once but twice a manager had to break up a fist fight in my section, simultaneously pounding on the ceiling with a broomstick to get the raccoons living in the attic to STOP the freaking SCRATCHING and arguing with Beatrice about the thermostat.

1 year ago: blow-drying my chin-length hair in preparation for another in a series of boring blind internet dates, trying to decide what I think of my new job, still entirely shocked that they hired me, planning exACTly how I'm going to spend that first paycheque (hello VISA bill!).

Yesterday: blow-drying my hair...psych! Yesterday was Sunday. I don't bathe on my days off. On my days off I mostly read books of varying quality/importance, walk around my neighbourhood ostensibly doing errands, sit in High Park, do laundry/groceries/random cleaning and make mental lists of all the things I should be doing instead of walking/reading/cleaning/sitting - but only for a minute. Then I get over myself and enjoy the day as best as I can. Made dinner for the first time for PaGa, enjoyed some visiting and snuggling, then did the dishes and went to bed early.

5 songs I know all the words to: Too easy! How about 5 songs I thought I knew all the words to? 1) Beatles, 'Get Back' - 'Jo Jo was a man who thought he was a woman'. 2) Toto, 'Africa' - 'sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the seregeneeez' I still have no idea what I thought a 'seregeneeez' was, but I sung it faithfully for years. 3) Bangles, 'Manic Monday' - 'it's just an automatic Monday'. Especially embarassing, considering I knew what the NAME of the song was. 4) Beach Boys, 'Barbara Ann' - bop bop bop, bop bop-a-ram. Okay, it was grade 3, but still. 5) perhaps the most enduring of my misheard mishaps - the alphabet 'and the letter P' instead of 'L, M, N, O, P'.

5 snacks: triscuits, green grapes with cheese, dill pickles or anything dill-pickle flavoured, the perfect (ie. hard and un-bruised) granny smith or red delicious apple, freezees.

5 things I'd do with $100 million: wipe out family/friends mortgages/debt (take THAT student loan centre!), give my brother money to get 'dryft boardsports' off the ground, buy gram & gramps a house near great grandma in Thunder Bay, pay for my cousins/siblings post-secondary education choices, travel with friends/family. Pretty sappy and unoriginal, but there you have it.

5 places I would run away to: mom & dad, anywhere near the water, my bed (under the blankets), Cayman Islands if I'd just robbed a bank, grade 3 - the seekrit fort in the woods behind our house.

5 things I would never wear: anything with a thong, anything with horizontal stripes, a cummerbund, white pants, those stupid flat boots with furry trim all the kids are wearing.

5 favorite TV shows: CSI Las Vegas, That 70s Show, Star Trek: Next Generation, Firefly, What Not to Wear

5 greatest joys: singing, listening to music, reading, surprising people, talking to strangers

5 favorite toys: mini ipod, AnBa's loaner dvd/surround sound system, super teeny compact umbrella, super cozy no-skid blue slippers, Action Hero on my kitchen wall.

5 people I'm tagging: Ha! Roro, Katicus, Hairstick Gal, Call-een, Chateau Nice. Bring it!!