I Am Very Thankful and a Bit Ashamed

Since I started writing on this blog again, I have been very appreciative of every reader that I have and very thankful for any comments that they may leave. One of the few people to have ever left a comment was a blogger by the name of GunDiva. I believe she added me to her list of blogs back before my writing hiatus and started reading it again when I picked the blog back up. She left a comment back in May on the post about my wedding etiquette. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that other people, other than the friends I am always bothering, read the blog. Well, to make a short story, that I made long due to my rambling nature, short again, two weeks ago she left a message on one of my posts saying that she had an award for me at one of her blogs. I followed the link that she typed at the end of her comment and found a post with information about the Liebster Blog Award which is awarded to blogs with fewer than 200 followers. I have never received any awards but apparently most blog awards have rules. The rules for the Liebster Award are as follows,

1. Thank the blogger who nominated you and include a link back to their blog.
2. List 11 random facts about yourself.
3. Answer the 11 questions given to you.
4. Create 11 questions for the bloggers you nominate.
5. Choose 11 bloggers to nominate and include links to their blogs.
6. Go to each blogger's page and notify them of their nomination.

As flattered as I am to be nominated, I don't think I can accept the award. The reason for that is that I use this blog as a very megalomaniacal way to vent. In keeping up with that egotistical use of a blog, I don't necessarily read other blogs. Therefore, I can fulfill the first three rules of the award, but unfortunately, I cannot do the last three as I do not know 11 bloggers to nominate. I feel very bad about expecting people to read my ramblings when I don't follow anyone else but I am an egocentric bastard and I can't change that. I know I should strive for personal improvement but that seems like too much work so I would much rather just apologize for being self-absorbed and move on.  As I said before, I cannot fulfill the last three requirements but I will go ahead and do the first three just for fun.

The first rule was that I had to thank the blogger who nominated me and include a link back to their blog. I believe I have already done that in the first paragraph but, just in case that doesn't count, I will do it again. Thanks go to GunDiva for nominating me when she received the Liebster Blog Award for Tales from the Trail. I am really just thankful to have a reader, the nomination is just a very nice plus.

There, I did it. I thanked someone and it sounded halfway genuine. I am still trying to perfect my fake genuine but, for some reason, it is harder than it sounds. The second task was that I had to list eleven random facts about myself. I have proven before that I suck at writing random lists as I tend to elaborate more than I need to but I will give it another try.

1. Although I do not believe in ghosts or the supernatural anymore, I used to be scared of almost everything when I was growing up. This went as far as me having to wake my brother, who was four years younger than me mind you, in the middle of the night if I had to use the bathroom so that I would not have to walk in the dark alone.
2. I strongly believe that I don't like seafood even though I like calamari and catfish and crab rangoon and shrimp and sushi.
3. I have a tendency to try my hand at vegetarianism from time to time but I refuse to give up jello every time because life without jello just simply is not life.
4. I have a broken record player that just needs a new needle to play but I have no idea how to get that needle so it just sits in my room as part of the decor.
5. Speaking of record players, the only record I own is Lady Gaga's The Fame.
6. I cannot work without music so it is very easy to tell when I am actually doing work by listening to whether or not I have music on.
7. I am a hypochondriac psychosomatic so if you ever tell me you're not feeling well, I will start feeling the same symptoms in about half an hour.
8. Although I have a B.A. in literature, English class was my least favorite class in high school.
9. I have two favorite movies; Princesas, and The Bubble.
10. If you include guilty pleasure movies though you can add Miss Congeniality and Legally Blonde to that list.
11. This is the post with the most hyperlinks that I have ever written.

How did I do? I hope better than last time but you will have to decide that. The next task was to answer the eleven questions posited by the nominator. The questions, along with their answers, are,

1. What is your passion?  My passion is literature which is clear to anyone that has ever heard me talk about it. Apparently, I come to life and become very enthusiastic and energetic.
2. If you could do anything you wanted for the rest of your life, without having to think about money, what would it be? I have actually thought about this before and if I could do anything without having to worry about money, I would be a lifelong student. I find it sad that there is so much out there to be learned and so little time, and resources, to learn it.
3. What is your guilty pleasure? I don't know if it is a guilty pleasure but I do enjoy taking bubble baths with candles and wine while watching The Colbert Report. I tried reading but the book kept getting wet and, as much as I like it, music is for showers not baths. 
4. Favorite book ever?  First of all, that is not a question, regardless of the question mark in the end. However, I understand what the question would be and the answer is that I don't have one. I have three books that I list as my favorites; Fyodor Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, and Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis. These may soon be joined by Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle, but I think having four favorite books is a bit contrived.
5. Favorite movie ever?  For the answer to this "question" please refer to numbers nine and ten in my list of random facts about myself.
6. Have you ever met anyone famous?  Not famous per se. Although one time I did criticize a Spanish Christian rock singer's career for leaving a band and going solo within earshot of that singer. Needless to say, she shot me a very deserved dirty look. Unfortunately, I still did not learn to keep my mouth shut.
7. Who would you like to meet (living or dead, real or fictional) and why?  This is an easy one. Franz Kafka. I would kill to meet Franz Kafka. I maybe would not kill a human, but definitely a spider or some sort of bug (get it?). He was so far ahead of his time. He found ways to be depressed before depression was even a thing. In all honesty, I find him to be very human and would love to pick at his brain. Metaphorically, of course.
8. Biggest Pet Peeve? I absolutely hate it when people start saying something and then suddenly stop and refuse to finish what they were saying. I have ended friendships over it. It makes me question whether they trust me and whether or not I should trust them.
9. If you won the PowerBall or Lotto and wanted to donate a chunk to a charity, which charity would it be and why? I would donate a lot of that money to the Make-a-Wish foundation. It is because of them that our family got our first computer due to my brother's illness and although it is now obsolete and it no longer works, it is still stashed in storage because I can't bring myself to get rid of it.
10. Favorite place you've visited? I haven't been to many places so I don't really have a favorite place. If I had to choose, I would say Las Vegas though because you can walk around the street with a drink in your hand.
11. Where do you want to visit that you haven't been able to? I would love to visit Australia, even though I am scared of most of the animals there. A close second would be Prague because that's where Kafka is from.

That was harder than I thought it would be. It was still kind of fun. I think for my future posts I will just look for questionnaires and answer them. The rest of the rules I cannot fulfill as I don't really follow any blogs. However, and I know this is a long shot, I figured I would write eleven questions for my readers. I don't really expect anyone to answer them but it would be nice if someone did. Here we go.

1. Do you like my blog?
2. Do you like me?
3. Do you like me and my blog?
4. Do you like my writing style?
5. What do you like best about me?
6. Am I your favorite, or one of your favorite, person(s) in the world?
7. If you had the superpower to give anyone superpowers, what superpower would you give me and why?
8. What animal do you think best describes me?
9. Which post in my blog is your favorite (feel free to list all that apply)?
10. What activity would you most like to do with me if we could do anything?
11. Is there anything about me that I did not ask but that you would like to share?

I think these are some thought provoking questions that we have all been asking ourselves. I know I have my answers already but it would be fun to see what someone else comes up with because I am very interested in my readers and, more importantly, what my readers think of me. Until next time.