Seven random things

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My bloggy friend Debra over at Reflecting recently tagged me. I've not been tagged for one of these in a while, so sure. I'll play.

The idea is to post seven random, "weird" (read: "not widely-known." I think) things about myself. I'm supposed to tag seven others, but I'll not call out anyone. You may participate or not as the spirit moves you.

I seem to recall having posted some of these in other contexts, so for some of you these may seem less "weird." In any case, the list appears below the fold.

1) Long story, which I'll spare you of here, but one Christmas Eve on I-10 between Junction and Sonora, Texas, my daughters' mother and I rode in the semi of a trucker who quoted for us the opening lines of the General Prologue of the Canterbury Tales. In Middle English.

2) One year during college, I worked as an "assistant" for a large-animal veterinarian. Your life is considerably less complete if you've not helped three other men struggle mightily to hold a year-old boar down and listen to him squeal while the vet is castrating him. If that whets your appetite to learn of other ways in which your life is lacking but don't yet know it, just e-mail me. But I say in all seriousness that, for the things I learned and saw that year, I would trade very few things.

3) I once qualified to appear as a contestant on Jeopardy! The reason you never saw me was that you never saw me; they always qualify more people than they actually have room for in a season. But still. I qualified, dammit.

4) During my second year living in Mexico, a tour guide in Zacatecas invited me to move there from Durango and become a docent myself. I would have if I hadn't already promised myself I would return to the States at the end of two years. Besides, I knew that if I had stayed another year, I would most likely have just stayed there, period.

5) I have an embarrassingly intense love of this song:



This is weird even to me.

6) If you are with me in a Mexican restaurant and mariachis are performing there, consider yourself warned: If I know the words to their songs, I will sing along with them. Loudly. (And pretty well, too, if I say so myself.) Complete with gritos and shouts of encouragement. The consumption of alcohol is not a prerequisite for this.

7) I have attended three readings, years apart, by Carlos Fuentes, the last time when I was at Rice. At that reading, I said to him, "I've seen you read before," and he said, "I know. I recognized you."