The Big 100

To celebrate my 100th post, I'll share with you 100 things about me. They're listed in no particular order - just the order they popped into my head.

1. I lick the bowl when I eat ice cream.

2. I still have my Dressy Bessy doll, my Tim Bear, and my Fisher-Price Cry Baby Bear from when I was a little girl.
3. When I was a kid, many of my clothes were hand-me-downs from my sisters. Since lots of the pants were too long, and I didn’t want the bottoms to drag on the ground, I would walk on my toes. For this, I earned the nickname Twinkletoes.
4. My other nicknames? Kelley Belly, Smelly Kelley, Kelley Jelly Belly, the quintessential Smelly Kelley Jellly Belly, and just plain old Smell.
5. I named my son after my father, who is named after his father. After having three daughters and two nieces, my dad deserved a little recognition.
6. When I was a teenager, my mother used to braid my hair for me every morning and tie a ribbon in it.
7. Before I became a teacher, I worked for a bra company. Used to get a lot of free bras. Now I pay retail.
8. In college, I changed majors three times.
9. I wore braces on my teeth for nearly six years on my bottom teeth. Now they’re all crooked again. (Sorry Mom and Dad.)
10. I eat popcorn almost every day.
11. Sometimes I snort when I laugh.
12. I feel naked without earrings.
13. On my very first date ever, when I was almost 16, a boy with a curly perm took me to see the movie Arthur. The boy was so nervous that he was sweating like a pig. At one point during the movie, he shook his hair, probably to unstick it from his head, and I got sprayed with his sweat.
14. I have bad luck with men. (It all started with #13.)
15. I can’t fall asleep without my sound machine. I listen to cricket or rain sounds.
16. I’m afraid of clowns.
17. I crack my knuckles, my wrists, my toes, and my back.
18. I stopped eating red meat and pork the day I came home from high school after dissecting a pig in biology class and found that my mother was serving pork chops. And I won’t each chicken unless it’s boneless.
19. I used to have such rough spots on the bottom of my feet that my friend used to call them tap shoes.
20. I get really crabby when I’m tired.

21. I have a blue spot under the skin on my palm from poking myself in the hand with a pencil when I was in kindergarten.
22. I have a blue spot under the skin on my left cheek from poking myself in the face with a pencil when I was in 6th grade.
23. My favorite color is blue.
24. I love pie. Pah.
25. When I was pregnant, I craved Slurpees, hotdogs, and stuffed clams.
26. I used a dishwasher for the first time this year.
27. I once had a polymer clay bracelet project published in Jewelry Crafts magazine.
28. I love limericks.

29. I’d like to write a children’s book.
30. I pay for my gym membership every month, but I never go.
31. I hate to sweat.
32. I used to be afraid to go to the dentist.
33. I went through a red phase in high school when I wore red boots or red shoes all the time.
34. I also went through a purple lipstick, purple blush, and huge earrings phase.
35. I always seemed to lose my purple lipsticks, purple blushes, and huge earrings. I later found out that my father sneakily confiscated my wacky items – one by one. He gave all of them back to me when I didn’t want them anymore.
36. My mother taught me to knit.
37.I knit every day.
38. I’m very easily startled.
39. Even though I’ve been divorced and single for more than seven years, I still sleep on my side of the bed.
40. Sometimes I drool on my pillow when I sleep.
41. I wear socks to bed.
42. When I was in 3rd grade, I was proud that I could spell Czechoslovakia.
43. I took dancing lessons – ballet, tap, and jazz – for ten years.
44. When I was old enough to drive myself to dancing lessons, I would blow off class and drive around for an hour. I still have nightmares that it’s recital night and I don’t know any of the dances.
45. I once cut my bangs off right at the scalp. They were frizzy.
46. I love mermaids.
47. When I was in college, my friends and I used to crank call a group of guys in my dorm on Sunday nights after the Dr. Ruth show was on the radio. I could do a mean impression of Dr. Ruth and the guys never knew it was me.
48. My pocketbook and wallet are always a disorganized mess.
49. I have good intentions, but don’t always follow through.
50. I love my garage.
51. I dropped my son on his head when he was little. I’m still really sorry about that, but he’s okay. Really. He didn’t fall far.
52. I hate hate hate baby squeaky toys.
53. I can’t stand suction of any kind.
54. I love Hello Kitty.
55. I put way too much Splenda in my coffee. I do this every day.
56. I love orange food - anything made with pumpkin, carrots, or sweet potatos.
57. Lost is one of my favorite shows. I get goosebumps when I see commercials for it.
58. I love watching Project Runway.
59. I still have a nightgown that I got for Christmas when I was a teenager. Both of my sisters got the same one.
60. My son recently told me that I’m becoming more and more like my mother. He meant it in the nicest possible way.
61. I love my family.
62. I often dream that I have to pee and can’t find a bathroom – or the bathroom I find is gross – or there’s no privacy.
63. Other times I dream that I’ve gone to school without wearing pants.
64. Nearly every time I go to Panera for Stitch ‘n Bitch, I get the Portobello Mushroom and Mozzarella Panini.
65. A few weeks ago, I went into a Starbucks and ordered myself a latte – all by myself. I didn’t get intimidated and leave without ordering like I did that other time I went to Starbucks.
66. I used to have a wicked lisp when I was a kid. I went to speech classes in elementary school. I think I was cured during that class when a mean, lisping girl named Sally Sachse put a big blob of past on my tongue with a craft stick. Thally Thacth.
67. I still lisp sometimes when I get really nervous.
68. I crack up on the inside when little kids and old people swear.
69. When I was in high school, my friend and I were standing at the door of our English classroom waiting for the bell to ring. We saw a banana peel on the floor in the hallway. We looked at each other and laughed. One of us said, “I wonder if anyone ever really slips on a banana peel.” Seconds later, a boy came around the corner, slipped on the banana peel, and fell on the floor. My friend and I laughed (we were teenagers – no self-control). The boy thought we’d put the banana peel there on purpose. If only.
70. I’ve reached for the remote control to turn down the sound . . . at the movie theater.
71. My sister and I used to compete to identify which episode of the Brady Bunch was being shown within the first 30 seconds. Oh, my nose!
72. I’ve never been able to buy a toothbrush, coffee mug, or bicycle license plate with my name on it.
73. I love to read and always have a book in the works.
74. I like to read the book before I see the movie.
75. I’ve never read a book with a long-haired, shirtless man on the front cover. I never will.
76. I cried at the movie Titanic, right at the beginning of the movie, when things were still happy, because I knew what was going to happen and all those poor people on the ship had no idea.
77. I make up dumb songs in my head. Sometimes I sing them out loud. Some of the lyrics are angry and have 4-letter words. Most of them are sung to the tune of “Jingle Bells.”
78. I once made up a little song about my cat, Emmie Ming May, and I would sing it to her all the time. I drove my boy nuts. When I showed pictures of Emmie to my 3rd graders, I sang the song to them. It drove most of them nuts, too, but quite a few of the kids loved it and sang it with me. Then I called my boy’s cell phone and had the class sing the song on his voicemail, just because he said I couldn’t get them to do it.
79. I clip coupons, but forget to use them.
80. I’m really uptight about my money. I balance my checkbook to the penny.
81. I often brush my teeth in the shower.
82. I used to take extra Equal and Splenda packets from Dunkin’ Donuts until my then-5-year-old son pointed out that I could buy them at Stop & Shop.
83. One of my all-time favorite movies is Baby’s Day Out. I bought it on DVD for him for Christmas since our old VCR ate both of the copies we owned before.
84. I like Sudoku.
85. In order to retire some day, I’m going to have to find myself a sugar daddy.
86. When I was little, I cried when my sisters went to Girl Scout camp and I slept in their beds while they were away.
87. I used to have a hard time sleeping over at a friend’s house. I’d last until about 10 or 11 pm, and then I’d call home pretending to be sick. My dad would have to come pick me up. I finally spent the whole night at one friend’s house after my father bribed me with 4 shiny quarters.
88. I once stuck a bead up my nose.
89. I weigh myself every morning.
90. My mother caught me with a cigarette in my hand when I was in high school. I blamed it on another girl, telling my mom I was “holding” it for her. She never believed me.
91. I am still friends with two of my favorite people who I’ve been friends with forever. They’re goodies. One of them has been with me since we were tiny, and the other we picked up in junior high school.
92. I sat at the same blackjack table as the actor Paul Sorvino in Atlantic City. I played one hand. I lost.
93. When I was 16, I worked at Burger King. Eddie Murphy came through the drive-thru one Saturday afternoon. He ordered two cheeseburgers, mustard and onion only, and an orange soda. He had a real, live cat sleeping on the dashboard. This is a true story. No one believes me, but it was him. Our Burger King was right off I-91. Easy off – easy on.
94. When I was a kid, my mother liked to keep my hair cut short. One day, at the North Haven Fair, a horribly nasty woman said to me, “My husband thinks you’re a girl and I think you’re a boy. Which are you?”
95. I once won $101 by calling into KC101’s Worst Joke Wednesday.
96. I accidentally killed my son’s beta fish by dropping it into the sink when I was trying to change its water. I fell into the drain and I tried to fish it out with a spoon. I got him out, but he didn’t make it. Still feel bad about that.
97. One of my favorite pictures of myself was taken when I was little, sitting on our back porch reading a book and wearing a sweater hand knit by my mother.
98. I still love to call out, “Huckle Buckle Beanstalk,” when I find something I’ve been looking for.
99. I’m extremely ticklish.

And the big 100 . . . I’m happy and healthy.