NTKOG #199: The kind of screaming narcissist who demands you ask her about herself, then fulfills your requests in spades.
I am: catastrophically self-absorbed, but try to keep it under wraps.
I am not: going to act like that information’s so surprising. I mean, it’s sort of the crux of blogging, right?
The Scene: Right here. Yesterday. I put out an open call for any questions you might have that aren’t covered by the blog and man did y’all comply. IN SPADES. In fact, there are enough questions that I’m going to go ahead and reply over the course of a few posts, lest y’all OD on me all in one sitting.
Go ahead and keep submitting questions if you’ve got ‘em! Around noon on Monday, I’m going to send $5 Amazon gift certificates to my favorite question or two!
Without further ado, the Q&A:
From Dave (aka: TKOMom’s platonic online crush)
Do you have a book deal in the works?
Ha, thank you, but no book deal. Although, at the risk of sounding like a total doucher, I am slowly working on a book proposal to send out to agents at the end of this year. If nothing else, it’s good writing practice (slash taking-rejection practice, of which I can never get enough.)
Is TKOMom as funny in person as she writes?
TKOMom is amazing. She’s definitely as funny as she writes. In fact, all of my family memories involve the four of us, sitting around, cracking jokes like a more risque SNL writers meeting. And watching vintage 90210, obviously.
How much of your quirks are exagerated for effect, i.e. whatching people eat?
Sadly, all of the quirks and neuroses are pretty much me. While I’m sometimes capable of turning off my analytical/anxious brain and just rolling with life, I spend way too much time staring at people and getting genuinely over-invested in their smallest movements. Especially watching people eat. I’m obsessed with that shiz — despite or perhaps because of the fact that it usually disgusts me.
From real-life friend Physicist:
WHY ARE YOU SO AWESOME???
Sssshh. If I spread my secrets, then everyone else would do it too. Don’t want to diminish my market appeal… ;-)
Why is your taste in music “stealing it from physicist”?
I have literally zero taste in music. Fun fact: a few weeks ago, in a fit of pique, I organized my whole iTunes library into playlists according to who had recommended it to me. There was exactly one band that I discovered on my own. And, actually, only one list of music recommended by ladies.
Why is stuffed T-Rex the best thing ever?
Everyone should get one. I gave one as a dang wedding present this year!
Are you actually Ryan North after traveling back in time and getting a sex change?
You’ll note that no one has ever seen us in the same room… Which is probably because if I were ever in a room with Ryan North, I’d be under a table having a panic attack.
From Michelle:
Would you rather have a lifetime supply of raisins the size of watermelons, or watermelons the size of raisins?
Dude, YOU ALMOST TRICKED ME. At first I was like, oh, obviously watermelons! Their one flaw is their cumbersome size! Then I realized: if the raisin-melons still have thick rinds, obviously no go. I’d take the giant raisins (gag) and wrap them in aluminum foil to give to homeless dudes slash keep in my apocalypse bunker. If raisin-melons have edible skins like grapes or kumquats, though, dude, sign me up.
From Tyler:
What was the hardest part about leaving everything you’ve known? And what part of your new life is the *most* rewarding?
The hardest part of moving was losing my whole social group — people I’ve been great friends with for years and was accustomed to being able to call or see every time I wanted some company. I’m making a conscious effort not to make many friends here, because having a social life is a distraction I neither want nor need, but every once in a while I have a day where I’ve already called or emailed every person in my inner-circle at least twice and I’m still just, y’know, lonely.
Then again, the best thing about ditching my life? I’ve learned to be at peace when I’m alone with my thoughts and use my constant independence as a way to kick my ass into productivity. Huge win.
Oh, and also have you ever smelled phantom gin in an area with no vegetation whatsoever?
I see what you’re trying to do there! You’re subtly trying to find out if I’m an alcoholic? Right? RIGHT?! Oh shit, is paranoia another sign of alcoholism?! For what it’s worth: no phantom gin, but I do often smell phantom sawdust and/or canned soup.
From Danielle (of the infamous blowing-bubbles-to-quit-smoking suggestion):
What’s a juicy story of you and The Ex that you haven’t shared with us?
Hope he doesn’t mind me sharing this one! I first mentioned moving to Boston in December ’08, but he and I had a lease until July ’09. So, since we are reasonable people and still loved each other, we decided to table the break-up talk until April, go to Lake Tahoe and make a weekend mini-vacation out of it. The cheapest hotel in Tahoe that met our requirements? A seedy, mountain-top sex motel called the Fantasy Inn.
Which is how The Ex and I ended up spending Easter weekend drafting the first negotiation of our break-up in an entirely mirrored room next to the Graceland Suite in the scuzziest motel ever. (Also, for you prying minds, it was an almost entirely platonic sex-motel vacation. We hit Blockbuster and rented a few new-release DVDs, which we spent the weekend watching from the in-room Jacuzzi. Yeah, we’re total ballers.)
IS TKOMom that awesome in real life? If so, can she become a regular guest poster?
I keep telling her to write me more guest posts! Maybe you can talk some sense into her!
Which would you give up – alcohol or your microwave?
Microwave. No contest. I only use it once every few weeks; the rest of the time, it just serves as the only counter space in my tiny kitchen.
Have you taken a strippercize class? Because I think you should.
I haven’t. Yet!
Would you rather have feet for hands or ears for eyes? (that’s a really weird question and it’s freaking me out just imagining it)
Good gravy, woman! That’s horrific! I think I’d have to go for ears for eyes, though. With no eyes, I’d significantly decrease the amount of time I spend surfing the internet. Plus, in my fiction I tend to spend a lot more time working with smell, touch and taste imagery than with visual, so I don’t think I’d be missing much.
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Guys! I’m finding this ludicrously fun! If you’re horribly bored by this post, let me know (or just skip it and come back in a few days), but if there are no objections, I’m going to keep answering ’til I run out of questions. Either way, have exquisite weekends, loves!
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If you could live 100 extra years or bring back one person from the dead for a year, which would you choose?
Oh I didn’t even have time to ask my questions yet!
Okay:
1. What are the names of your future hypothetical children and/or pets? (Or, alternately, you can just say you hope to never have children and/or pets and forget I ever asked.)
2. If you were on death row, what would you request for your final meal? Also, what would you have done that put you there?
3. What really did you get your degree in, and what does it mean, and why, and are you happy you did?
4. What is one thing that you would never, ever, ever do for the sake of this blog? (I’m not talking about things that are wrong or illegal, or bring significant harm to another person, just a personal project you’d never take on… like… you’d never spontaneously quit your job, or you’d never meet someone in a hotel who you had only talked to over the internet. You know, something like that.)
Sorry. Wordy questions.
Your first two questions are so appropriate for TKOG that I thought you must be cheating (like, you know her in real life). They’re great questions, and I don’t wanna steal TKOG’s self-absorption thunder, but I can’t resist offering these tangential answers:
1. TKOG and I already came up for the best name for a dog. It’s Ponzi. Perfect for a pug. Every time he comes into a room looking playfully devious, you could say, “heyyy Ponzi… whatcha schemin’?”
2. In fact, TKOG, PWCU-famous hostess and queen of themed parties, threw a death row dinner party potluck. For the three small dining tables, TKOG hand-crafted a centerpiece of a different method of execution: a noose hanging from a wire-sculpture tree, a balsa wood guillotine with aluminum foil blade, and a syringe floating in a narrow vase, ringed by black-spray-painted toy guns. Each guest provided the last three songs that he/she would want to hear on death row; we put them in a playlist on shuffle for the background music. Finally, as a souvenir for the guests, she printed up all the guests’ recipes in a booklet with, if I recall correctly, the pages bound together by toy handcuffs. Genius! Amazing! Wonderful!
Dear, won’t Ken O be jealous that you alluded to Dave as my plutonic online
crush?
Well yeahhhhhh, but how warm and fuzzy is Dave feeling right now?!
And yes, the first time I have used the third person!
Dear, I must add that if there are three of you then we MUST share.
Is it totally TMI to say that I’m happy to share, in more than one way?
FYI, I don’t mind that story being told. It’s not the juiciest I could have imagined by a long shot. (Is that relief or disappointment in my voice? It’s the internet, so there’s no way of knowing.)
Ooooooh, what story would you have told? I just happen to think the sex-motel break-up is especially hilarious (especially with the context that I kept waiting for a phone call from my parents about my grandmother — what a surreal weekend.) Also, heads-up, cutie: I’m writing an “All About The Ex” post to address all ex-themed questions. So remind me of juicier stories and I might tell one…
MORE NEEDED THEN!! I do love juicy stories. They make the internet so much more fun, especially since TMI Thursdays is gone :(
When you said that you are “catastrophically self-absorbed, but try to keep it under wraps” I felt like you had just described me too!
Yey! Thanks for answering my questions! I’ll try to get drunk and come up with some even awesomer ones that don’t deal with replacing body parts. Or maybe I should. Human Centipede anyone?
Also, Fantasy Inn: GREAT name for a seedy motel. I can’t believe you guys didn’t take advantage of it.
You have terrible taste in music???
I have fantastic taste in music. You should email me a few of your favourite bands and I will recommend a few for you to check out. I would even burn you a cd. Or two. Or…five.