1. I finish every shower with 5 minutes of the coldest water that will come out.
2. For the last four years I have refused to buy new clothing except in the case of underwear and socks. I only wear second-life cycle clothing & T-shirts that I get for free. I don't do it to be a self-righteous scenester, but because I think it'd be arrogant and gluttonous of me to encourage the production of new clothing when there are literally warehouses of functional clothing sitting wasted in every city.
3. I think environmentalism and civil rights are swell as hell, and alliteration is my favorite poetic device.
4. I sure like going out!
5. I'm evangelically agnostic. This means that I'm agnostic myself, and that I want to spread my philosophy to as many others as are willing to listen (for their own benefit and the benefit of others and not for my own). This does not mean that I rudely approach strangers without any prior introduction to lobby them to give up their spiritual beliefs and to take up my own in the manner that so many 'evangelical' theists do.
6. I despise Coca-Cola, Pepsi, McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, Frito-Lay, Hershey's, Nestle, etc.
7. I used to play Magic the Gathering fervently as a tween.
8. In the summer after my freshmen year of college I rode a bicycle from Tampa, FL to Stone Harbor, NJ without any friends or starting money.
9. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time from Nintendo 64 and the original Pokemon Red & Blue Gameboy games are what inspired me to ride my bicycle from Tampa, FL to Stone Harbor, NJ without any friends or starting money.
10. I have a large T-shaped scar on my right shoulder (your left) left over from a horrendous car crash involving a minivan packed with 8 teenagers.
11. My older memories were jumbled into an impossible order following that car crash. There doesn't seem to be any affect on my post-crash memories.
12. I can never find either my keys, wallet, cell phone, or car. I never have all four at once.
13. You look absolutely breathtaking, and you're extremely talented and interesting on top of that!
14. My worst fear used to be "dark water," so I intentionally started training to become a beach life guard to address the problem head-on. I made it onto the squad and conquered my fear, thankfully before that awful movie called "Dark Water" ever came out.
15. I came up with an original 7-tone musical scale which doesn't resemble any of the Grecian modes or any of the blues modes.
16. I despise pharmaceutical companies.
17. When I was a freshmen in high school I was illegitimately diagnosed with depression and prescribed to Prozac against my will. I was living at a boarding school at the time, and so my hall-parent was informed of the medication I was taking, and mistook an occurrence of average teenage angst as a "threat to myself and others." As a result, the school I was attending locked me in the health clinic for three days against my will, and finally told me I was going to stay with my family for a week to "cool-off" before returning to campus and continuing with my courses. That was a lie, and as soon as I got off the plane my grandparents informed me that the school was never going to allow me to return in the first place. Rather than filing the episode as an expulsion, they offered my family the option to sign a document stating that I'd left the school of my own free will and with my family's support.
18. I want to make it my life's ambition to break the system of 2 party politics in the United States.
19. I'm not vegetarian or vegan, but I'm very suspicious of the quality of meat in the United States. I'm picky about what kinds of animal foods I'll eat.
20. I'm more in favor of legally un-recognizing ALL "marriages" than I am in favor of legalizing gay "marriage".
21. Until that happens, I'm a ferocious supporter of legalizing gay marriage.
22. I believe that the more truly multicultural we become, the less of ourselves we will invest into an arbitrary religious, national, or corporate ideology. This is because we will and should value our own heritage less in order to recognize and psychologically accommodate for the collective importance of all world cultures and their achievements and offerings to humanity.
23. I believe that an organized religion, a state or or national government, and a corporation are all essentially the same things.
24. I'm very slowly and reluctantly giving into what seems to be an inevitable agnostically-pantheist-human transcendentalist sense of spirituality. I can use several hyphens in one sentence and use lots of lofty and pretentious words all in a row so you should think I'm great now.
25. I'll just bet that one day most humans will have certain types of synesthesia.
Comments (23)
Big hug. You're a goof.
Why #16?
I loved Magic: The Gathering! Go Green!
Synesthetism is fascinating ... I try to imagine sometimes what it would be like to see music and taste colours ... Do their senses work normally otherwise? Do they still taste food according to content, or only according to colour (or shape or whatever)? Do they still hear the music the same way we do, or do they only see it? Amazing, amazing way to live.
Good list, lots to think about, lots you have done and experienced.
I've been following your blog for a while, because I've found striking similarities in what we believe in and how we think. I agree with #5, 20-23, and maybe 25.
On multiculturalism and religion, I think you will enjoy "American Evangelicalism" by Christian Smith.
Cheers
#15 -- I'm VERY interested to hear this scale... I studied music history and the multitude of scales formally for 3 years in college until I felt like it would erupt from my throat. Now that its had time to gel, I'm interested again. Lay it on me!
@FunnymanGeorge - I'll do another post about it. Thanks for your interest!
#12...I feel ya. Yesterday was the first day in literally WEEKS that I had my purse (including wallet, of course), cell phone, keys and car all at the same time.
I
you 
I don't buy new clothes either, but it's because I'm lazy and don't like shopping. I think your reason is better.
Yay! I'm a super human! o_o If I could, I would avoid using red words for the rest of my life. If only it were possible. Letters (but mostly letter combinations) have their own colors, and a good number of words do, too. Only certain sounds/songs have colors. Sometimes something tastes like something else smells, but that could have something to do with that cavity between the nasal passage and the throat or whatever.
My mom, my sister, and I are all synesthetes. Not so much that like everything imaginable is scrambled, but... mostly words -> colors type synesthesia. My sister and I once had a conversation on Myspace about the colors of the months. Ha.
ANYWAY.
Very interestingg.
Oh yeah, and. What IS that little animal with the camera?
facebook
@trustmyreason - How accurate of you.
@AllMyNamesAreTaken - It's my childhood's favorite animal: the echidna!
@AllMyNamesAreTaken - Would you please private message me to talk about your synesthesia?
@Alex_Horschack - Ohh. Haha, it's Knuckles!
If you use AIM, when I get back from the rec center I can IM you. :) But I gotta work out tonight so I don't have a guilt-tasm. lol.
very interesting views. i'm i will support you 120% in your effort for number 18!
@Alex_Horschack - I am just cool like that... and I heart facebook... it’s helpful for planning events and making people aware of different issues...
I'm a synesthete! I sort of see color when I read or do math; certain letters/numbers in my mind are certain colors, and different combinations blend into overall color combos, i.e. the word tomato is yellow, red, and black, whereas tomatoes is red, yellow, and green, because "e" is the strongest green letter for me. One of my younger brothers has it too, but the rest of my family see's things normally. Also, my cousin said that he gets a feeling about cetain letters, rather than sees a color. For instance, he told me "n" was a "mean" letter, and that "o" was much nicer, haha. I will say, it really helps with spelling and grammar!
That's some crazy wisdom. I'm down with it, though.
For 6 months, from southern Chile to Nogales, Mexico I did the "Indian Dance" every time I took a shower b/c it was always freezing cold.
The summer before my sophomor year of college I biked from Middletown, CT to Bangor, ME (via Quebec and New Brunswick)-- albeit with some starting cash. People came out of the woodwork to help me. I biked 70 to 100 miles a day, slept hard, rinsed my clothes, let them dry on my body. It was magical.
You must have been very warm, eh? It was hot enough up north.
Synesthesia is fascinating, to say the least.
It is a strange pitfall of modern life that joy and individuality are often mistaken for "gayness" rather than being appreciated on their own merits.
And more...
25.That's an interesting thought about people who have synesthesia
#8 means you're my hero<8
i simply love the photo on top there....
3, 20, and 21 could be my favorite things.
Ever.