Not To Be Trusted With Knives

400

July 1, 2007 by Beth

You know I can’t resist a list. This is my 400th post. And here are 400 things about me. I was going to make them totally random, but as the list progressed¹, I ended up grouping things and having several lists of “the 10 (or 15 or 25) most recent…”, which I freely admit are kind of filler, because 400 is a big number, dammit! But it still gives you some insight into me and publishing the most mundane things about oneself is what the internets was designed for, isn’t it?

It’s a very long post, so I suggest you sit down with a nice cold diet Pepsi (or possibly an orange mocha frappichino) and settle in for a wild ride in the psyche of Dr. B. To make it easier on you, I’ve hyperlinked on all the footnotes (and, when you are done reading a given footnote, just click on it and it will bring you back to where you were in the list.). You’re welcome.

OK, without further ado (I’m *so* sick of ado already!), here are 400 things. If you actually read them all, you are almost as crazy as I am.

My Childhood

1. When I was little, we had two dogs. Their names were Brandy and Gin. Which is funny, because my parents are both teetotallers. They were both of the same breed, Dandie Dinmont Terriors. I thought they were called “Brandy Didn’t Want Ontario.” Apparently I really was always meant to live in BC.
2. For a brief period, I truly believed that my name was spelled Beht.
3. My first bed was a brass bed. I wanted one because one of my aunts had one and I thought it was sooo cool.
4. When I was 3 years old, I could count to 101. I believed that 101 was the highest possible number – it did not occur to me that something could come after 101.
5. Also at 3 years of age, I memorized my favourite book, “Donkey Daniel in Bethlehem,” because I made my mom read it to me so many times. I would flip the pages and recite the words and I honestly believed that I was reading. Until I tried to read another book – I opened it up and was very upset when I didn’t know the words. I remember thinking “Oh no! I’ve forgotten how to read!”
6. I attended kindergarten three times. OK, that’s not as bad as it sounds. My sister was 2 grades above me and my mom volunteered to help out in my sister’s kindergarten class, so she just brought me along and I took part in all the kindergarten class activities. The next year, my mom volunteered to help out in the special needs class, so the kindergarten teacher said that I could just go and play in the kindergarten class while my mom was volunteering. The next year was my actual year in kindergarten.
7. Because I attended kindergarten three times, I read my school’s entire book collection for kindergarten, grade 1 and grade 2 by the end of own my kindergarten year. I remember reading a grade 2 book with a purple monster on the cover at the end of kindergarten, although I have no idea what the book was called.
8. The nickname my family gave me very early on in childhood was “Messy Bessy.” Anyone who knows me will understand how this came to be.
9. When she wanted us to behave, my mom would tell us that we better be good or “I’ll rip your face off.” My mom had long nails and I was pretty sure that she could actually do this.
10. ChiPs was my favourite show when I was a kid. I *loved* Erik Estrada. Loved!
11. My mother told me and my sister that if we drank directly from the water tap, a snake would come out of the tap and go right down our throats. We believed her.
12. I was sure that I would grow up to be the first women to play major league baseball.

Academic Stuff

13. In my undergrad, I majored in Biochemistry
14. While majoring in Biochemistry, I minored in Drama
15. I can legitimately put all of the following letters after my name: B.Sc(Hons), M.Sc., Ph.D.
16. I have current or past memberships in 11 academic organizations
17. In the 6 years of my PhD, I only had to take 18 credits (3 credits = a one semester class)
18. I had straight As in my graduate work (Masters and PhD)
19. I did not have straight As in my undergrad. In fact, I had a few really dismal marks²
20. I have only been to 9 university campuses
21. I attended 3 campuses of those as a student
22. I have taught students from kindergarten all the way through to university professors
23. I have won three teaching awards
24. I have won 17 academic awards
25. I accumulated over $70,000 of student debt
26. I was a postsecondary student for 11 years
27. I am trained in Radionucleotide Safety and Methodology
28. I was required to take Chemical Safety Training at all three universities I attended, as no university seems to recognize each others’s training, despite the fact that WHMIS (the core of what was taught in each training session) is a national program.
29. I have judged in two national science fairs
30. I was mistaken for a student at one of those science fairs (the students are in high school and I was 28 years old at the time)

My Family

31. I have one sister
32. I have one niece
33. I have two living grandparents
34. I have 6 biological uncles
35. I have 6 biological aunts
36. I have 14 first cousins
37. 3 of those first cousins are named Robert
38. I have 9 first cousins once removed
39. The youngest of those first cousins once removed is only 5 days old!
40. I will have 1 first cousin twice removed in August
41. When my first cousin twice removed is born in August, we will have 5 living generations on my dad’s side of the family (great-great-grandparents, great-grandparents, grandparents, parents, kid)
42. My parents still live in the same house they were in when I was born

Anthropometrics

43. I’m 5 ft tall
44. I’m 5 ft 4 when I wear my boots, my ebay shoes or my new red platforms!
45. I have blue eyes
46. I am constantly asked if I am wearing coloured contacts. For the record, I am not.
47. I naturally have brown hair, but right now it is a reddish-blondish colour
48. I’m not telling you my weight, but it is within the healthy BMI range
49. I wear size 6 shoes
50. I wear junior boys hockey equipment
51. I’m still wearing glasses that I bought 7 years ago, despite the fact that my prescription has changed several times and my glasses have been stepped on and thus are crooked on my face.
52. My proper prescription is -7.5 in one eye and -9.0 in the other

My Addiction to the Internet

53. I have 8 email addresses
54. I write on 3 blogs
55. I have 4 computers in my house
56. 3 of those computers actually work
57. 2 of those 3 computers I typically have running 24/7.
58. I created a wiki for my family’s Christmas wish list
59. My current Technorati rank is 237,134
60. I have 167 Facebook friends (almost all of whom I actually know in real life!)
61. I have 1407 pictures posted on Flickr
62. I am currently using 40% of my 2871 MB of storage in Gmail

Food

63. I’m a lacto-ovo vegetarian
64. I take my coffee black with sweetener
65. I take my tea with sweetener and soymilk
66. My favourite food is, and always has been, French fries
67. I also enjoy French fries’s fancy cousin, poutine
68. I love dark chocolate; milk chocolate, not so much
69. I prefer diet Pepsi to diet Coke
70. I know how aspartame is metabolized in the body, and no, it won’t give you MS, brain tumours or minor heart explosions.
71. If I had to pick a favourite vegetable (not counting French fries), I think I’d say asparagus
72. If I had to pick a favourite fruit, pineapple (or possibly mango)
73. I dislike pie crust; I prefer to eat the filling from the pie and leave the crust.
74. I believe that cake is merely a vehicle for icing

Physical Activity

75. Hockey is hands down my favourite sport to play
76. I was once the highest scorer on my hockey team, despite having the worst shot in the history of the sport. My secret: get in good position in front of the net and wait for one of the good players to pass me the puck.
77. I played softball as a kid from about ages 7-13 (or maybe 14… can’t quite remember). Since then, I haven’t played until this year
78. The first time I ever surfed was on my 30th birthday trip to Tofino
79. Since grade school, I have run in three races: a 5K, a 10K and a half marathon.
80. As a kid, I took 3 karate lessons. There was a special promo where you could get 3 lessons for $10. I quite enjoyed it, but my parents did not enroll me in any lessons after that.
81. I have learned the following types of dance at some point in my life (and to varying degrees of success): salsa, merengue, square, pole and two-step.
82. I took swimming lessons up to pre-bronze.³ I was too young to move on to bronze at that point, and I never ended up going back to it once I was old enough.
83. I spent a few years on my hometown’s swim team as a kid; my favourite race was the butterfly, because so few people entered that race that sometimes you could win a medal simply for being one of the three kids in that competition.
84. I firmly believed that being an alternate on the track & field team in elementary school was the best position on the team. No one ever got hurt on race day, which meant that I got the day off of school, got to sit in the sun eating freezies, and never had to exert any effort by actually running in a race.
85. I’ve done the Grouse Grind a grand total of three times
86. My hiking goals for this summer is to do the Grind at least 2 more times, Mount Seymour to first peak, the Chief, and Black Tusk.

Things I Like (in no particular order)

87. lists
88. footnotes
89. juxtaposition
90. my niece
91. cheesecake
92. cats that act like dogs
93. dogs that act like dogs
94. Vancouver
95. Jager Bombs
96. platform heels
97. risotto
98. Stephen Colbert
99. my Treo
100. sunshine
101. Taylor Pyatt
102. my job
103. my other job
104. my third job
105. Indian food
106. my mitochondria

Things I Don’t Like

107. Calgary
108. spiders
109. Nicholas Cage⁴
110. meat
111. the word “incentivize”
112. David Emerson
113. selfishness
114. the fact that I can only renew books from the Vancouver Public Library two times, even if no one else has requested the book
115. American cars
116. American beer
117. pain
118. jerks

Things on My Desk At Work Right Now

119. photo of my niece
120. photo of me with a bunch of friends
121. another photo of me with a bunch of friends
122. a computer
123. hand cream
124. file folder rack thingy
125. travel mug
126. water bottle
127. pen holder (with pens!)
128. box of business cards
129. pile of other people’s business cards
130. stapler
131. staple remover
132. stamp that says “COPY”
133. yellow highlighter
134. pen
135. another pen
136. pencil
137. binder with notes from meetings
138. contact lists which I was too lazy to put back up on my corkboard
139. unopened packet of soy sauce
140. mess⁵

Provinces To Which I’ve Been

141. British Columbia
142. Alberta
143. Saskatchewan
144. Manitoba
145. Ontario
146. Quebec
147. Prince Edward Island

Fifteen of My Favourite Quotations

148. “If religions was based on scientific evidence it would be called “science”… and no one would believe it.” -Stephen Colbert
149. “I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.” -Douglas Adams
150. “Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me… one can survive everything nowadays except that.” -Lord Henry Wotton in The Picture of Dorian Gray
151. “It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.”-John Stuart Mill
152. “In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.” -Douglas Adams
153. “Creationists make it sound as though a ‘theory’ is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night.”-Isaac Asimov
154. “Women need not always keep their mouths shut and their wombs open.”-Emma Goldman
155. “A physicist is just an atom’s way of looking at itself.”-Niels Bohr
156. “As an adolescent I aspired to lasting fame, I craved factual certainty, and I thirsted for a meaningful vision of human life – so I became a scientist. This is like becoming an archbishop so you can meet girls”. -M. Cartmill
157. “The advantage of a classical education is that it enables you to despise the wealth that it prevents you from achieving.” -Russell Green
158. “The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.” -George Bernard Shaw
159. “Sleep is wasted on the sleeping.” -Nick Parlante
160. “Physics is not a religio

     n. If it were, we’d have a much easier time raising money.” -Leon Lederman

161. “I feel bad for the man that can’t spell a word more than one way.” -Mark Twain
162. “I don’t want to achieve immortality through my work… I want to achieve it through not dying.”-Woody Allen

Places I’ve Published

163. Bone
164. Alcohol
165. Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research
166. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews
167. Bioteach
168. the internets

Every Pair of Footwear That I Own

169. black shiny heels
170. black matte heels
171. black shiny wedge heels with a strap around the ankle
172. my CFM boots
173. ebay shoes
174. red platform heels
175. brown, two thick straps, chunky heels that I bought in Seattle
176. Asics running shoes
177. Circa skater shoes
178. winter boots
179. hockey skates
180. rollerblades
181. strappy black wedge heels that I bought for my graduation
182. black Stoneridge sandals
183. brown strappy sandals with cork wedge heel
184. black flip flops
185. red flip flops
186. light blue Crocs
187. silver ballerina flats
188. black slip ons
189. black ankle high boots that are so worn I should really throw them away
190. silver shoes with the clear plastic heels that have lights inside that light up when you walk that Danielle would not leave the house with me if I was wearing them

Icons on My Laptop’s Desktop

191. Recycle Bin
192. QuickTime Player
193. Internet Explorer
194. Adobe Reader 8
195. AVG Free (anti-virus software)
196. InterVideo Win DVD
197. Firefox
198. Recovery Disc Creator
199. TOSHIBA Assist (I don’t even know what this does)
200. Window Live Messenger
201. Window Media Play
202. Microsoft Outlook (which I *never* use at home)
203. Palm Desktop
204. Palm Quick Install
205. Documents To Go (also for Palm)
206. Eat Right Analysis (a diet analysis program)
207. Telus eCare (again, something I never use)
208. Flickr Uploadr
209. iTunes
210. blog.txt (a draft of this blog posting, which I was working on in Notepad, saved to desktop)
211. Skype

The Last 10 Books I’ve Read (or Am In The Process of Reading)

212. The Math Gene: How Mathematical Thinking Evolved and Why Numbers Are Like Gossip by Keith J. Devlin.
213. The Heathen’s Guide to World Religions by William Hopper
214. Race Against Time by Stephen Lewis
215. Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder
216. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
217. The Minority Report by Philip K. Dick
218. The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster by Bobby Henderson
219. The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins
220. What to Eat by Marion Nestle
221. Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace

The Last 5 Movies I Have Watched

222. Zoolander
223. Spider-Man 3
224. Day Watch
225. Die Hard with a Vengeance
226. Live Free or Die Hard

Last 25 Google Searches That Lead People to My Blog

227. gay bar pony seattle
228. longest gun name
229. telus bundle phone cell internet
230. funniest spam
231. funny names for IT geeks
232. what does not destroy me
233. crazy latest names
234. Canada eagle cam
235. dunk tank siren
236. Danielle needs
237. mon blog sexy
238. Vancouver women’s ice hockey
239. 23 reasons why I am awesome [um, did they really think they’d find this on the web??]
240. sex playlist
241. stripper named Courtney
242. Canucks trade Jason King
243. sexy Beth
244. OSAP pays students every month [you wish!]
245. wear the fox hat
246. table of contents shows pages in Roman numerals
247. you have to excuse me I’m not at my best
248. clinic sex free
249. cut off salan calgary
250. Beth Kaede
251. icicle aphrodisiac⁶

The Last 25 Cities from Which My Blog Readers Have Come

252. Mountain View, California
253. Burnaby, BC
254. Toronto, Ontario
255. Farmingon, Connecticut
256. New York, New York
257. Livonia, Michigan
258. Seoul, Kyonggi-do,Korea
259. Linköping, Ostergotland, Sweden
260. Bangalore, Karnataka, India
261. Dearborn, Michigan
262. Berlin, Germany
263. Seattle, Washington
264. Delta, BC
265. Calgary, Alberta
266. Tyler, Texas
267. Asheboro, North Carolina
268. Greenville, South Carolina
269. Atlanta, Georgia
270. Ottawa, Ontario
271. Vancouver, BC
272. Herndon, Virgina
273. Naples, Floria
274. Allen, Texas
275. Thousand Oaks, California
276. Torino, Piemonte, Italy

The Last Ten People Who Have Written on My Facebook Wall

277. Kalev
278. Kelly
279. Ian
280. Lianna
281. Danielle
282. Dan
283. me
284. Kim
285. Clayton
286. Tenny

The Last 25 Songs I Listened to on my iPod

287. Fuck Her Gently by Tenacious D
288. From Blown Speakers by the New Pornographers
289. Material Girl by Madonna
290. In the Ghetto by Elvis Presley
291. Mr. Jones by the Counting Crows
292. Lips of an Angel by Hinder
293. Tainted Love by the Cure
294. Build Me Up Buttercup by NOFX
295. Ball and Chain by Social Distortion
296. Holy Virgin by Groove Coverage
297. Get Together by Madonna
298. Animals by Nickelback
299. Lucky Love by Ace of Base
300. You Oughta Know by Alanis Morisette
301. Sex Changes by the Dresden Dolls
302. Poison by Groove Coverage
303. Better Together by Jack Johnson
304. Little Bones by the Tragically Hip
305. Church of Hot Addiction by Cobra Starship
306. The Other Man by Sloan
307. The Anti-Racist Sing-a-Long by Closet Monster
308. Kiss Kiss by Groove Coverage
309. Promiscuous Girl by Nelly Furtado
310. In A Sweet Dream by Strata

The Last 25 People Who Emailed Me

311. Lori
312. Dave
313. Meenu
314. Nancy
315. Erika
316. Christel
317. Alison
318. The Georgia Straight
319. Jen
320. Lovey
321. Phillip
322. Lori
323. Th

     e Vancouver Public Library

324. Kalev
325. Carrie
326. Ziba
327. Jody
328. Theresa
329. Jason
330. John
331. Lincoln
332. JB
333. Pay Pal
334. Tanis
335. Balie
336. Shalu
337. Mike
338. Agatha

The Last 10 Pieces of Snail Mail That I’ve Received

339. bank statement
340. mail for my former roommate
341. mail for my former roommate’s ex
342. bank statement from the other bank
343. free sample of shampoo
344. Visa bill
345. dentist visit reimbursement cheque from my health plan
346. optometrist visit reimbursement cheque from my health plan

347. junk mail about my Visa

348. AmEx bill

349. pension plan papers

The Last 9 Pieces of Snail Mail That I’ve Sent

350. signed contract for my new job teaching science to kids, sent to the employer
351. grad photo sent to my uncle and aunt⁷
352. postcard with a photo of me & Kelly running on it, sent to Kelly
353. postcard with a photo of me & Kelly running on it, sent to my sister & neice
354. postcard with a photo of me & Kelly running on it, sent to my mom & dad
355. postcard with a photo of me & Kelly running on it, sent to Danielle
356. birthday present sent to my sister
357. newspaper article sent to Danielle

The Last 15 Things I Ate⁸

358. authentic Dutch apple pie, made by my Dutch friend Christel
359. Cobb’s Country Harvest Bread with cream cheese on it
360. spinach/chickepea/tofu/zucchini/carrots/green pepper curry with brown rice
361. refried beans, tomatoes, mushrooms and green onions in a whole wheat wrap
362. egg McMaster and a cup of coffee
363. veggie maki rolls, tempura, and teriaki tofu
364. Cobb’s Country Harvest Bread, toasted with cream cheese and tea
365. an apple
366. a banana
367. veggie pakora, naan, pulao rice, Bombay Aloo and a mixed veggie dish that name of which I can’t recall and which doesn’t seem to be in their online version of their menu
368. ice cream bar and a diet Pepsi
369. toast with peanut butter & honey and tea
370. veggie burrito
371. salt & vinegar chips, chocolate & a diet pepsi (which I smuggled into the movie theatre)
372. egg McMaster and a cup of tea

The Last 25 Websites I Accessed

373. IMDB
374. wikipedia
375. dictionary.com
376. Image West hair
377. flickr
378. telusmobility
379. Global News
380. my work’s website
381. Translink
382. Canucks.com
383. CFOX.com
384. Molson.com
385. CTV News website
386. Google Reader
387. Work Email
388. Hotmail
389. Young & the Restless spolier site
390. Environment Canada’s weather forecast
391. Google Analytics
392. The Colbert Report on the Comedy Central website
393. Facebook
394. Stats Counter
395. My Blog
396. Blogger
397. Gmail

Random Stuff

398. There are 17 letters in my name.
399. My porn name is Brandy Mountainview
400. I am never, ever, ever doing something like this again. Why, oh why, do I get such stupid ideas into my head. I thought this would be easier than finding 200 sites to link to. I stand corrected.

¹ya, I’ve been working on this for a little while now, when I noticed that I was approaching my 400th blog posting. Yes, I do have a life, why do you ask?)

²I hate your analytical chemistry and first year physics!!

³ I don’t know if they still use the colour categories like they did when I was a kid. Bronze was the first step of the lifeguarding qualifications, after you went through all the basic levels of swimming lessons – blue, orange, green, red, maroon, plaid, or whatever.

⁴I have an irrational hatred of Nicholas Cage. I don’t know why I don’t like him. I just don’t

⁵So messy, in fact, that I nearly had to resort to calling my cell phone from my office phone to find it on my desk the other day

⁶ones that didn’t make my most recent 25, but which I couldn’t resist telling you about:

• get paid watch porn films
  
• middle aged women porn
  
• naked Aggies
  
• list of things and people that have pissed me off
  
• pre porn
  
• hands spontaneously started bleeding
  
• danielle rocks
  
• how to make danielle happy
  
• danielle needs needs [is it just me, or does someone have a Danielle obsession??]
  
• sperm all over moms boots
  
• [and my favourite] injured doing keg stand

⁷ I had sent grad photos to all my aunts andes, but this particular one was “returned to sender” because I’d forgotten to add the apartment # with the address. And apparently the post office couldn’t figure out that they should just deliver it to the house where all the other mail at that address with the same name was going. So I had to re-send it. Way to go, Canada Post!

⁸Wow, compiling that list made me realize how crappy I’ve been eating lately. Yikes! They are going to want to take back my doctorate in Nutrition if I keep this up!

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