Things what are true and things that be false...
It's fessin' up time for the Eight Truths and Two Lies Meme.
meresy,
brynnmck and
callumvixen each spotted one of my lies, but the tricky thing here is that everything is in fact true...
1. I once had sex in a Peugot with a Gendarme. There's just something about the uniform...
True. I did indeed have sex in a Peugot with a Gendarme. The Gendarme was my boyfriend and the Peugot was his. Funny adjunct to this story is that we were parked at the top of an embankment and the parking brake was accidentally released at some point during the assignation. Neither of us noticed that we had rolled some 30 metres down the hill until we actually stepped out of the car. Austrian Gendarmes are apparently not burdened by Fraser-like ethics as he did not issue himself a ticket, despite copious ribbing from friends and witnesses. I would have been far more embarassed were it not nighttime as well as quite cold out (steamed up windows) and so it was impossible to actually see into (or out of) the car.
2. One sunny and pleasant spring morning, on the way to kindergarten, my foot was run over by a Bell Telephone truck.
Also true.
j_s_cavalcante helpfully pointed out that it would have been rather grotesque if my foot was off to kindergarten all on its lonesome, nevermind getting run over by a large and heavy service truck. Hee. My poor foot, which was thankfully attached to my body, was run over at the intersection of State and Elm in Chicago. The poor driver was so wracked with apprehension and guilt that he immediately drove us to the nearest casualty centre and stayed with us the whole time. I think the man must have had visions of his life slipping away before his very eyes. My foot was fine, no breaks, no cuts, not even a bruise.
3. There is an outstanding warrant for my arrest in Milwaukee, WI. The warrant was issued when I failed to appear in court on a jaywalking ticket.
A LIE...sort of. This was a popular choice, and I'm wondering if it's because people don't think I would leave a warrant outstanding (in this case, I would) or if they just can't believe one would even be issued for such a ridiculous violation. The truth is this really happened and the warrant does still stand to this day (as far as we know). The person caught jaywalking was my best friend and she had no choice in missing the court date as she was leaving to resume college at Evergreen State within a couple days. She got understandably annoyed and snippy with the asshole cop issuing the citation and so he made the ticket "appearance only" as opposed to pay fine by mail. When she explained to him that her appearance would be impossible he ominously informed her that a warrant would be issued in such case. Neither of us has ever been back to Milwaukee.
4. When I was a child, I was detained at the border on suspicion of espionage while attempting to cross into a communist country.
100% TRUE. I was seven or eight years old, travelling to visit Budapest with my mother, her best friend, Mary and my cousin. Mary and I both had US passports while my mother and cousin had Austrian passports. We were detained at the Hangarian border for almost six hours while our luggage, car and personal effects were searched several times. I was asked some very bizarre questions and our books and camera equipment seemed to be particular interest to them (our film was all confiscated).
Once we arrived in Budapest we found it impossible to get a hotel room. The hotel we had reservations with was suddenly "full" after seeing the US passports and this played out again and again over the next few hours. We were all exhausted and it was nearly midnight when we sat down for some juice at a hotel bar that was still open and a man who had overheard the hotel clerk refusing us a room offered to take us to his mother's house so that we could stay in her spare room. We were understandably apprehensive about trusting him but the alternative would have been to sleep in the car and likely get arrested. His mother turned out to be a fabulously sweet little old lady who spoke not a word of either Englisch or German but welcomed us into her home with open arms and refused to take money (we hid some in the room anyway).
Communism and the Cold War. Fun times. It was shortly after this that I got my Austrian passport.
5. I have seen Tom Cruise in person twice, several years apart, at the exact same location, which also happens to be where my foot was run over by a Bell Telephone truck.
100% Trufax. Returning to the corner of State and Elm, I saw Tom Cruise the first time while he was filming the scene from Risky Business in which he goes to Lana's apartment. If memory serves correct, the awning from Chicagoblooms is visible in the outside shot, this was less than a half block from the Gold Coast apartment I grew up in (hi Stella!). Lana's apartment was located in my piano teacher's building.
The second time I saw the Crazy Scientologist was several years later. I had to do a double take because his hair was standing on end, a look I'd never seen on him before. My double take was noticeable as we walked by each other and so he grinned and nodded his head, but I still wasn't positive until a couple days later when there was an article in the Trib about TC and which area pool halls were being used to film The Colour of Money.
As this was still well before the Scientology and the Crazy took hold, it was a little swoonworthy, especially since Risky Business was about the hottest thing I'd seen as a grade schooler.
6. I have set foot in 20 different countries. The farthest north I’ve ever been is Iceland.
And....TRUE. My original writing of this sentence was a little misleading in that it implied I had actually spent quality time in 20 different countries so I changed it to " set foot in" to account for the 6 which were only airport and vicinity layovers. A couple days spent in Reykjavik, Iceland is indeed the farthest north I've ever travelled (with close seconds being Anchorage, Alaska and Kobnhaven, Denmark. The breakdown is:
Airport:
Luxembourg, UK, Denmark, Japan, China, Taiwan ROC
Actual time spent:
Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Brussels, France, Italy, Hungary, Yugoslavia (Slovenija), Indonesia, Singapore, Iceland, US, Mexico. And CRAP! I just realised I left off The Netherlands! OK, so it's 21 countries.
Notice how none of these is Canada? This needs to be rectified post haste!
7. I was a very nervous teenage driver. During my first year of driving I ran more than 20 red lights, had four significant fender benders and was taught how to parallel park by my best friend. She had never driven a car.
Here's the other LIE. This is again my best friend, who was, self-admittedly, the biggest flake in the history of teenage drivers! She went through so many red lights and stop signs, with such regularity, that I eventually became inured to it, generally just clapping a hand over my eyes and bracing myself for impact without comment. She never received a ticket for this particular poor habit. It was always amusing when we had a new friend in the car and they'd be shrieking up a storm and asking me how I could just calmly sit there.
I'm the one who taught her how to parallel park and in return, several years later, she taught me how to drive. It went a little like this: I bought my first car when I turned 20. She took me around the Old Orchard parking lot a couple times late at night. Another friend drove me to my driving test, which I took in my own car, which I had only driven three times at that point. Then the BFF and I set off for Maine (where I was working oversummer) in my car. She drove all but one and a half of the 25+ straight hours it took us to get there, often in driving rain and zero visibility. Once in Maine, my boyfriend took over driving duties. I didn't actually start driving my car until it was winter and we were back in Chicago. Needless to say, driving in severe winter weather teaches you how to control your vehicle pretty quickly and it wasn't long before I became the cursing and wily daredevil and speed demon I now am. :)
8. At 14 months of age, I could swim the width of a swimming pool but not the length.
True! I was born in Santa Barbara and we had a swimming pool. It was the 70's and very popular to throw your infant in the pool (the theory being babies naturally swim due to remembering the womb), so I was toodling and flapping around the pool, sans flotation, from a very young age. I think this has shaped my life-long affinity for being in water and is probably one of the reasons I have such deep love for scuba-diving.
9. While working on a fish boat in Alaska, I nearly died. The coroner's report would have included the phrase "gummy fish".
Very true. I worked salmon season in Bristol Bay between my freshman and sophomore years of college, despite tremendous trepidation on the part of my parents. While the entire enterprise can be dangerous, salmon season is far less hazardous than any of the three crabbing seasons, so I won them over in the end. We had around 10 severe injuries on our boat, several of which required air-lifting out. I managed to get through the entire six weeks unscathed (save for the same requisite tendonitis and carpal tunnel that everyone suffered) and didn't get into trouble until the last hour on the boat. We received word that we were leaving literally an hour and half before we left and so there was a mad insane scramble to get belongings together and say goodbyes. I had just finished packing, and stuffed the last of the sour gummy fish my mother had sent in a care package into my mouth when a bunkmate startled me and the gob of fish lodged in my throat. I required the Heimlich and thankfully survived, because THAT would have been an embarassing end to the adventure, eh?
10. The only time I have ever been sacked from a job was by a Canadian company.
Sadly very true. Toronto Dominion/TD Securities you FAIL. I think it's rather humourous that I've been fired by Canadians without actually having set foot in Canada.
Every job I've ever had was left voluntarily to move onwards or upwards until I was let go by Toronto Dominion (along with many others) in the wake of 9/11. I had at that point worked on the CBOE trading floor for nearly eight years, starting out as a runner and making my way up to Broker (as in stands in the pit with the fugly jacket and badge shrieking and hollering). The marketplace was already in the process of changing (privatisation, automation) when 9/11 occurred, but the ensuing thrashing the market took, both financially and in volume caused waves of lay-offs everywhere. I would have likely been easily snapped up by another firm because my reputation on the floor was very good, and I have been asked by old colleagues why I never got in touch or pursued this option, but I chose to see it as the opportunity to make a clean split and move in a new direction. So now I work from home and have far more flexibility to pursue things I love...painting, golf and travelling! It took some time for me to break from the habit of having CNBC on constantly in the background though.
So there you have it. There were several things that didn't make it into the final ten, but I guess I'll save those for the next time this thing makes the rounds!
meresy,
brynnmck and
callumvixen each spotted one of my lies, but the tricky thing here is that everything is in fact true...
1. I once had sex in a Peugot with a Gendarme. There's just something about the uniform...
True. I did indeed have sex in a Peugot with a Gendarme. The Gendarme was my boyfriend and the Peugot was his. Funny adjunct to this story is that we were parked at the top of an embankment and the parking brake was accidentally released at some point during the assignation. Neither of us noticed that we had rolled some 30 metres down the hill until we actually stepped out of the car. Austrian Gendarmes are apparently not burdened by Fraser-like ethics as he did not issue himself a ticket, despite copious ribbing from friends and witnesses. I would have been far more embarassed were it not nighttime as well as quite cold out (steamed up windows) and so it was impossible to actually see into (or out of) the car.
2. One sunny and pleasant spring morning, on the way to kindergarten, my foot was run over by a Bell Telephone truck.
Also true.
j_s_cavalcante helpfully pointed out that it would have been rather grotesque if my foot was off to kindergarten all on its lonesome, nevermind getting run over by a large and heavy service truck. Hee. My poor foot, which was thankfully attached to my body, was run over at the intersection of State and Elm in Chicago. The poor driver was so wracked with apprehension and guilt that he immediately drove us to the nearest casualty centre and stayed with us the whole time. I think the man must have had visions of his life slipping away before his very eyes. My foot was fine, no breaks, no cuts, not even a bruise.
3. There is an outstanding warrant for my arrest in Milwaukee, WI. The warrant was issued when I failed to appear in court on a jaywalking ticket.
A LIE...sort of. This was a popular choice, and I'm wondering if it's because people don't think I would leave a warrant outstanding (in this case, I would) or if they just can't believe one would even be issued for such a ridiculous violation. The truth is this really happened and the warrant does still stand to this day (as far as we know). The person caught jaywalking was my best friend and she had no choice in missing the court date as she was leaving to resume college at Evergreen State within a couple days. She got understandably annoyed and snippy with the asshole cop issuing the citation and so he made the ticket "appearance only" as opposed to pay fine by mail. When she explained to him that her appearance would be impossible he ominously informed her that a warrant would be issued in such case. Neither of us has ever been back to Milwaukee.
4. When I was a child, I was detained at the border on suspicion of espionage while attempting to cross into a communist country.
100% TRUE. I was seven or eight years old, travelling to visit Budapest with my mother, her best friend, Mary and my cousin. Mary and I both had US passports while my mother and cousin had Austrian passports. We were detained at the Hangarian border for almost six hours while our luggage, car and personal effects were searched several times. I was asked some very bizarre questions and our books and camera equipment seemed to be particular interest to them (our film was all confiscated).
Once we arrived in Budapest we found it impossible to get a hotel room. The hotel we had reservations with was suddenly "full" after seeing the US passports and this played out again and again over the next few hours. We were all exhausted and it was nearly midnight when we sat down for some juice at a hotel bar that was still open and a man who had overheard the hotel clerk refusing us a room offered to take us to his mother's house so that we could stay in her spare room. We were understandably apprehensive about trusting him but the alternative would have been to sleep in the car and likely get arrested. His mother turned out to be a fabulously sweet little old lady who spoke not a word of either Englisch or German but welcomed us into her home with open arms and refused to take money (we hid some in the room anyway).
Communism and the Cold War. Fun times. It was shortly after this that I got my Austrian passport.
5. I have seen Tom Cruise in person twice, several years apart, at the exact same location, which also happens to be where my foot was run over by a Bell Telephone truck.
100% Trufax. Returning to the corner of State and Elm, I saw Tom Cruise the first time while he was filming the scene from Risky Business in which he goes to Lana's apartment. If memory serves correct, the awning from Chicagoblooms is visible in the outside shot, this was less than a half block from the Gold Coast apartment I grew up in (hi Stella!). Lana's apartment was located in my piano teacher's building.
The second time I saw the Crazy Scientologist was several years later. I had to do a double take because his hair was standing on end, a look I'd never seen on him before. My double take was noticeable as we walked by each other and so he grinned and nodded his head, but I still wasn't positive until a couple days later when there was an article in the Trib about TC and which area pool halls were being used to film The Colour of Money.
As this was still well before the Scientology and the Crazy took hold, it was a little swoonworthy, especially since Risky Business was about the hottest thing I'd seen as a grade schooler.
6. I have set foot in 20 different countries. The farthest north I’ve ever been is Iceland.
And....TRUE. My original writing of this sentence was a little misleading in that it implied I had actually spent quality time in 20 different countries so I changed it to " set foot in" to account for the 6 which were only airport and vicinity layovers. A couple days spent in Reykjavik, Iceland is indeed the farthest north I've ever travelled (with close seconds being Anchorage, Alaska and Kobnhaven, Denmark. The breakdown is:
Airport:
Luxembourg, UK, Denmark, Japan, China, Taiwan ROC
Actual time spent:
Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Brussels, France, Italy, Hungary, Yugoslavia (Slovenija), Indonesia, Singapore, Iceland, US, Mexico. And CRAP! I just realised I left off The Netherlands! OK, so it's 21 countries.
Notice how none of these is Canada? This needs to be rectified post haste!
7. I was a very nervous teenage driver. During my first year of driving I ran more than 20 red lights, had four significant fender benders and was taught how to parallel park by my best friend. She had never driven a car.
Here's the other LIE. This is again my best friend, who was, self-admittedly, the biggest flake in the history of teenage drivers! She went through so many red lights and stop signs, with such regularity, that I eventually became inured to it, generally just clapping a hand over my eyes and bracing myself for impact without comment. She never received a ticket for this particular poor habit. It was always amusing when we had a new friend in the car and they'd be shrieking up a storm and asking me how I could just calmly sit there.
I'm the one who taught her how to parallel park and in return, several years later, she taught me how to drive. It went a little like this: I bought my first car when I turned 20. She took me around the Old Orchard parking lot a couple times late at night. Another friend drove me to my driving test, which I took in my own car, which I had only driven three times at that point. Then the BFF and I set off for Maine (where I was working oversummer) in my car. She drove all but one and a half of the 25+ straight hours it took us to get there, often in driving rain and zero visibility. Once in Maine, my boyfriend took over driving duties. I didn't actually start driving my car until it was winter and we were back in Chicago. Needless to say, driving in severe winter weather teaches you how to control your vehicle pretty quickly and it wasn't long before I became the cursing and wily daredevil and speed demon I now am. :)
8. At 14 months of age, I could swim the width of a swimming pool but not the length.
True! I was born in Santa Barbara and we had a swimming pool. It was the 70's and very popular to throw your infant in the pool (the theory being babies naturally swim due to remembering the womb), so I was toodling and flapping around the pool, sans flotation, from a very young age. I think this has shaped my life-long affinity for being in water and is probably one of the reasons I have such deep love for scuba-diving.
9. While working on a fish boat in Alaska, I nearly died. The coroner's report would have included the phrase "gummy fish".
Very true. I worked salmon season in Bristol Bay between my freshman and sophomore years of college, despite tremendous trepidation on the part of my parents. While the entire enterprise can be dangerous, salmon season is far less hazardous than any of the three crabbing seasons, so I won them over in the end. We had around 10 severe injuries on our boat, several of which required air-lifting out. I managed to get through the entire six weeks unscathed (save for the same requisite tendonitis and carpal tunnel that everyone suffered) and didn't get into trouble until the last hour on the boat. We received word that we were leaving literally an hour and half before we left and so there was a mad insane scramble to get belongings together and say goodbyes. I had just finished packing, and stuffed the last of the sour gummy fish my mother had sent in a care package into my mouth when a bunkmate startled me and the gob of fish lodged in my throat. I required the Heimlich and thankfully survived, because THAT would have been an embarassing end to the adventure, eh?
10. The only time I have ever been sacked from a job was by a Canadian company.
Sadly very true. Toronto Dominion/TD Securities you FAIL. I think it's rather humourous that I've been fired by Canadians without actually having set foot in Canada.
Every job I've ever had was left voluntarily to move onwards or upwards until I was let go by Toronto Dominion (along with many others) in the wake of 9/11. I had at that point worked on the CBOE trading floor for nearly eight years, starting out as a runner and making my way up to Broker (as in stands in the pit with the fugly jacket and badge shrieking and hollering). The marketplace was already in the process of changing (privatisation, automation) when 9/11 occurred, but the ensuing thrashing the market took, both financially and in volume caused waves of lay-offs everywhere. I would have likely been easily snapped up by another firm because my reputation on the floor was very good, and I have been asked by old colleagues why I never got in touch or pursued this option, but I chose to see it as the opportunity to make a clean split and move in a new direction. So now I work from home and have far more flexibility to pursue things I love...painting, golf and travelling! It took some time for me to break from the habit of having CNBC on constantly in the background though.
So there you have it. There were several things that didn't make it into the final ten, but I guess I'll save those for the next time this thing makes the rounds!