Jumping on the bandwagon

I've got a 10-mile run planned for Saturday and I was going to blog about it but I'm nervous about it and don't want to psyche myself out so to take my mind off of it, I figured I'd throw my hat in the ring. Some of my blog buddies have been doing this 25 Things list, and I've enjoyed all of them. Really I have, just haven't commented. Guess I should go back and comment on them... think I will.

Anyway, it inspired me.

1. I was named after my paternal grandfather. I have three brothers (no sisters) and my dad got to name two of us. He named me after his dad and my youngest brother after himself. Also, none of us four have middle names.

2. My daughters' names have very special meaning: Yvonne shares a name with her great grandmother (who is still around) and a middle name with both my grandmothers (who aren't) as both were Esperanza. Kennedy shares a name with my mother-in-law's birth name (last name) and Raquel is my mom's name.

3. I've shared this before but thought I'd expand on it. In one of life's biggest ironies (at least in mine), my wife did not take my last name. Why is this ironic? Throughout school - elementary through high school - I'd sometimes write down random girls' names and pair them with my last name, and wondered what my future wife's full name would be. None of the countless names ever came to fruition, and the time I spent on them was in vain.

4. I have a huge man-crush on Michael Chiarello. I am in awe of the man. Funny thing is, I hardly every make one of his recipes. But that does not lessen the man crush. At all.

5. I like to drink beer. Sad thing is, I hardly ever do these days. If I have a few beers, I feel them the next day. I don't hung over easily but I just feel a bit queasy. Yes, I'm a wimp. But when I was 300 pounds, I could knock back eight beers without feeling much.

6. I don't think patriotism means blindly following leaders and waving the American flag. I figure if you do your civic duty and vote, obey the laws, pay your taxes, inform yourself about what's going on with the government and in the country, donate, volunteer... that's along the lines of patriotism. To me anyway.

7. I once killed a chick by squeezing it to death. I was three. I didn't know what I was doing. I still get flak for it.

8. Nothing irritates me more, nothing makes my mood turn downright sour more than inconsiderate drivers. It's probably because I take so much effort to be considerate that when some jackhole cuts me off or is driving too slow in the fast lane or doesn't turn their blinker on, it just bothers me more than it should.

9. I don't really have one favorite band. I really like Rage Against The Machine, Metallica and Rammstein and recently I've gotten into The Killers and Flogging Molly. And of course I like Guns N Roses and Nirvana from back in the day.

10. Keeping the musical theme... I'm not a big concertgoer necessarily but I've been to a few. I've seen Rage five times, the band I've seen the most. The last concert I went to was Metallica on Dec. 12. That kicked major tail!

11. I never really had a lot of girlfriends. It's not that I didn't date, but I was bad at it. I had one serious girlfriend in my life, and I married her.

12. I love muffins. Everything about them. And I hate cupcakes. I think when I developed my love of muffins is when I started hating cupcakes.

13. I like to bake. When I'm older (like when my girls are out of high school), I want to work part time at a bakery.

14. I've driven from Southern California to my parents' hometown in Mexico three times in the last seven years. We used to take family vacations when were younger every now and then but I've made the drive as an adult three times. It's about 1600 miles and I love it.

15. I think I've been to more states in Mexico than I have in the US. Let me see: Mexico: Baja California Norte, Sonora, Sinaloa, Nayarit, Jalisco, Michoacan, Guanajuato, Chihuahua, Aguascalientes, Zacatecas, DF... I think that's it. That's 11. US of A: California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, Texas, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois. That's 11. Ha! The same. Although, I used to count Georgia and Florida because I had layovers in Atlante and Miami before but my wife doesn't allow me to count them :( Well, others have said the same but I blame her.

16. I don't consider golf and auto racing true "sports" in the sense of the word. Neither have a defense, and how athletic do you have to be to golf? Golf to me is like playing pool. I like billiards, playing it, and I've even played and enjoyed golf before, like real golf on a real course, not miniature golf. But I hate golf on TV; hate watching it, hate seeing it on sports highlights, hate the coverage it gets. I'm a hater I guess. NASCAR and Formula-One and all that, meh. I don't hate it but I don't follow it either.

17. I'm a freelance writer by trade, and I've interviewed many famous people, people who are revered and idolized in their homelands. Seriously. But most Americans have never heard of them. Why? They're soccer players. The most famous person I've interviewed is well known here, though: this guy.

18. I want to retire either in my parents' hometown (they have a house there) or in the Caribbean somewhere.

19. I think I have ADD. Seriously. It's very hard for me to keep my focus on certain things, many things, but when I find something that I really enjoy and can sink my teeth into, it's like tunnel vision. I took a test once online, like a test doctors use to screen people who may have ADD. It said that if you answered yes to more than 10 of the questions, you could have it. I answered yes to almost 30 of them.

20. I don't read books. This is very sad, I know. I should read books more often. However, when I find books I like, I can read them quickly. I read the last Harry Potter book in about two days. I read The Book (the running book I got recently) a lot. I read The Mag too, but that's not a book. Mags I can read but books... sad.

21. I dislike peanut butter. I can eat peanuts but not peanut butter. It tastes like butt.

22. I kind of like karaoke, although I never really have done it, well just once. For my 34th birthday (which will be in August) I plan on a karaoke-related party. Those who I invite will not need to bring presents or anything. All they must do is sing two karaoke songs, one they select and one I choose for them. I figure, I put this obstacle up so that when people try and negotiate with me, we'll negotiate down to one song which is what I really want anyway. Yes, I'm aware that I might be at my party alone...

23. My favorite candy is Skittles, followed closely by Lemonheads.

24. I didn't really care a lot about Disney and/or Disneyland until we got season passes. My mother-in-law kicked down with some passes for my girls' birthday presents in 2007, for which I'll be forever grateful (on an aside, I really like my wife's family, I lucked out in the in-law department). Now I'm a Disneyland freak. I'd go twice or three times a week if I could and never get bored.

25. I would love to get a motorcycle. Right before I met my wife I was looking into getting a motorcycle and taking classes on how to ride them. My wife DOES NOT like the idea of me getting a motorcycle, so it's never gotten past the I-would-love-to stage. But I think it would kick ass if I drove my daughter to school in a motorcycle.