Thank God for Lily from It’s a Dome Life. Every post I’ve sat down to write today has been…either not suitable for publishing or needs a little more work. But then Lily went and tagged me in her chain blog survey (which I promise not to tag you if you don’t want to be tagged), and answered a prayer.

Remember when these used to go out in mass e-mails to all of your best friends? I had a girlfriend in high school who would create her own…100+ questions of pure survey joy. In multicolor. This was also the days of shared notebooks that got passed around with notes back and forth to each other. Do kids still do that? Inquiring minds and all that shit…

Without further ado, here is the delightful survey of 25 questions regarding yours truly. Enjoy. I did.

1. Where were you born? I was born in the suburbs of Chicago. It is cold here. But then it gets super hot. And then cold again. If you don’t like the weather in Chicago, wait five minutes. Seriously. I’d love to move to Florida, or somewhere else that is warm and delightful. Unfortunately, I have this huge family here, and would never want to leave them. Which makes Brian ask the question, “So if you were born in Siberia, would you just…stay in Siberia your whole life?” Probably. But my plan is to get famous and travel. A lot. Especially in the winter time.

2. Were you named after someone? Yep. Mom has told me that she wanted to name me Brandy (such a FINE girl) or Annabelle Lee (hello morbid Poe poem much?) Luckily, Dad named me after his favorite cousin, Christine, and his mom, Regina.

3. How many children do you have? None. But I make an excellent Auntie Chrissy.

4. How many pets do you have? Well, unless you count Rufus, none. But one day, we’re going to have a pet sloth and name him Ebenezer. And maybe a pet baby penguin. Which I will give to Katie when he grows up and loses the fluffy appeal.

5. Your worst injury. HA! I have so many injuries that I can’t even think about which was the worst. But probably the knee sprain. That shit was painful. And still hurts sometimes, even though it was 10 years ago.

6. Do you have a special talent? Does injuring ones’ self count? I think I’m a pretty talented writer. I mean…not to toot my own horn (OK, yes I’m tooting my own horn, here), but I’m pretty good at it.

7. Favorite thing to bake. I like to bake cookies that come out of a package. And then I eat half the cookie dough. One for me, one for the pan. One for me…and then the ones that I bake are warm and fresh and delicious. And I eat those too. With lots of milk.

8. Favorite Fast Food. Portillo’s. Oh man I love Portillo’s. But not for the hot dogs. Nope. While they are delicious, they just aren’t as delicious as a beef and cheddar croissant with hot peppers. Which I had for breakfast. Which cleared my sinuses long enough for the Pseudophedrine to kick in. And the cheese fries. Best. Cheese fries. Ever. And I don’t even LIKE french fries. They are merely the edible spoon with which to eat the cheese (That’s a direct quote from Katie, btw).

9. Would you bungee jump? Hell no. But you know why? Because they hold you by your ankles. And I have weak ankles. Skydiving, on the other hand. I’m in. That shit is on my bucket list. I love the feeling of a free fall.

10. What is the first thing you notice about people? Honestly, I’m not sure. And I think it depends on the person. So maybe it’s whatever stands out about the person. When I met Brian, it was his eyes. When I met Katie it was her smile.

11. When was the last time you cried? Yesterday. Don’t ask.

12. Any current worries. I’ve been known to worry more than some. I’ve got several things on my mind, but believe it or not, Blog Friends, there are some things that I just don’t want public.

13. Name 3 drinks you drink regularly. Coffee, water, tea. God, I love my Keurig.

14. What’s your favorite book? Pride and Prejudice

15. Would you like to be a pirate? Yes. I have a treasure hunt obsession. McDonald’s Monopoly. Disney Pin Trading. Seashell hunting. It can get bad.  And then I would swim with the dolphins when I wasn’t busy pirating.

16. Favorite Smells. I love this question. I also love the following smells in no particular order: Hallmark (except the overly candled shops…too much of a good thing ruins the fresh card and wrapping paper smell. Seriously). Old books. New books. Lemon. Cookies. Burning leaves. Spring. Lilacs.

17. Why do you blog? Fame, fortune, and free stuff. No, seriously, I blog because I love to write, and there is this amazing online community of people who not only support my writing, they inspire it. Reading blogs and commenting on blogs inspires me to write new blog posts, to challenge myself, and to explore writing beyond any realm I’ve ever dreamed of.

18. What song do you want played at your funeral? Green Day. Basket Case JOKING! I mean Time of Your Life. And then a whole lot of party pop. Because who doesn’t love party pop? I’m Polish and Irish. We celebrate the shit out of someone’s life. So you better damn well celebrate the shit out of mine. In 100 years when I die of extreme age.

19. What is your least favorite thing about yourself. Tough call. I think it’s my innate ability to apologize for everything, even when I haven’t done anything wrong. This bothers Brian to no end, and I don’t even know why I do it. I’m going to go ahead and blame Mom for this one. (Sorry, Mom!) See what I did there?

20. Favorite hobby. Writing. Definitely writing. And cooking. Definitely cooking. But I also enjoy pretending I’m going to do things that I find on Pinterest.

21. Name something you’ve done, you never thought you would do? This is the toughest question of the bunch. And I’m really not entirely sure. I mean, my life plan didn’t exactly work out the way that I thought it would. But that was me not doing things I thought I would do. I’m going to go ahead and skip this question.

22. What do you look for in a friend. I like my friends to be overall awesome in nature. They should have a great sense of humor, positive attitudes, and think I’m just as fantastic as I think they are. They also need to be pretty smart. I get bored when people who can’t carry on an interesting conversation. Does that make me an asshole?

23. Favorite Fun things to do? Being silly with Brian. Sometimes we’ll just laugh for hours with no clue as to how we started or what we were laughing about. He’s the best.

24. Pet peeves. Oh God, I have so many pet peeves. That guy in the movie theater whose phone rings…and then he answers it…or worse ignores it, but fails to turn the sound off and it happens again and again and again. That’s a huge one. I’ve also experienced this in a church. Not cool, dude. Not cool.

25. Whats the last thing that made you laugh? There were some pretty excellent comments on my Facebook post this morning. I laughed pretty hard at those. (Oh yes, I’m going to make you go and check them out.)

So now I’m tagging ANYONE who is reading this and wants to post the answers on their own blog. Because I love all of you. 🙂

OH! And while you’re at it…feel free to go and vote for the Bloggies (fancy People’s Choice Style Blog Awards)! I’m a finalist (Along with my blog friends, Katie from Words for Worms, Joules from Pocketful of Joules, and April from First Time Mom and Dad).