100 things (how long before Emily pinches this one)

1. My favourite font is Comic Sans MS.
2. I hate the Arial font with a passion since it's the "standard" font.
3. That's pretty much the reason I hate writing in blue ink too.
4. At school I had three fountain pens filled with black, turquoise and purple ink.
5. My English teacher marked me down for writing in purple because it clashed with her red pen.
6. I liked English at school (despite that teacher).
7. But I hate writing essays so I didn't do it for A Level.
8. I did Maths, Biology and Chemistry instead.
9. Then I went to uni and did a science foundation year since my A level marks were pants.
10. Then I did the first year of a Molecular and Cellular Biology degree...
11. ...before dropping out after realising that although I liked it, it couldn't be my career.
12. (oh, and partly cos I failed the first year and would have had to resit it again).
13. Working in a library or bookshop has always been something I wanted to do.
14. I started my own library at 8 lending out my pony books to friends.
15. I still have some of those books...
16. ...and they still have the little number strips on the front that I made.
17. I feel that I don't have enough space at home...
18. ...even though it's just me and the cats in a three-bedroomed terraced house.
19. This is partly because the littlest bedroom is just used for drying washing...
20. ...and has two mattresses in that I wanna throw out.
21. The other spare bedroom is my library.
22. I'm thinking about moving it downstairs into the dining room
23. Anthony wants to create me a nice cosy reading space in there.
24. But we have to get the Yeti to shift his stupid hideous cabinet first.
25. Then I can have a proper spare room for when people come to visit, instead of making them sleep with the washing like Emily had to.
26. I want to get this done before November when my dad comes to stay.
27. Because we're going to see The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band at the Wolves Civic.
28. You may not recognise that band name but you'll know their most famous song, "The Urban Spaceman".
29. My eclectic taste in music is all my parents fault.
30. My mother got me liking Billy Joel, Elton John, Queen, Chicago and Bread.
31. My father is responsible for The Bonzos, Flanders & Swann, and CSN&Y.
32. They are probably about equally responsible for Joni Mitchell, and The Mama's and the Papa's.
33. My father is also responsible for me liking The Goon's and I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue.
34. We used to listen to them when driving long distances on holiday.
35. We also used to listen to I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again, which starred John Cleese and Bill Oddie among others.
36. This means that just saying "Lady Constance" or "Shut up Spot" makes me giggle.
37. Not to mention "He's fallen in the water!"
38. I say gnome as g-nom and legend as leg-end.
39. I can't spell out loud, I always have to write the word down.
40. I don't type properly, I only use two fingers on each hand.
41. This is because I learnt to type faster when I used to hang out in chat rooms a lot.
42. Despite the fact I only use four fingers I still type pretty fast.
43. But my spelling can be terrible as my head is usually two words ahead of my fingers.
44. When I read I read two sentences at a time.
45. This is why I read so fast...
46. ...but also why I'm not very good at reading out loud...
47. ...or reading non-fiction books.
48. I do try and slow down my reading sometimes by imagining I'm reading out loud.
49. But as soon as I stop concentrating on doing it, I speed right back up again.
50. I learnt to read very young.
51. I can remember mum teaching me with flashcards before I went to playgroup.
52. This is why they tease me for saying ball-et instead of ballet and mart-ron instead of matron when I was little.
53. Because I never heard them said, just read them.
54. That's also why I didn't know you said Sean like Shawn until I was 11.
55. My mother had an argument with my teacher when I was 7 cos I was reading The Hobbit in class reading time and the teacher didn't like it.
56. She said I should be reading Hammy the Hamster as it has "some very adult concepts in it".
57. Needless to say I carried on reading the Hobbit in class reading time.
58. When I read Lord of The Rings I still hear the voices from the BBC Radio Four production in my head.
59. So Ian McKellen isn't Gandalf, Michael Hordern is. (although I love the films too)
60. I don't actually own my own copy of LOTR, or the Hobbit.
61. But I do own all the DiscWorld books...
62. ...and have the first 15 in leather bound editions too.
63. They aren't for reading though, and I don't think most of them have even been opened.
64. I still have the first Terry Pratchett book I ever read.
65. It was Strata (not a DiscWorld book) and I bought it from the Barnardos in Billericay High Street when I was 10/11.
66. I used to buy most of my books from that Barnardos or from the Oxfam shop in the High Street.
67. Both shops are still there, and still in the same places.
68. Which is more than I can say for most of the shops I remember being there as a child.
69. I moved to Billericay in October 1984 when I was 5 (nearly 6)
70. We moved there from Istead Rise in Kent, where we moved after living in Stroud in Gloucestershire.
71. Before that we lived in Bahrain which is where I was born.
72. I do think of myself as an Essex girl at heart.
73. Even though I've never lived in East London I'm very drawn to that bit of London as that's when my parents are from.
74. That's why I support Leyton Orient (Come on Ronnie!) like my dad does.
75. Like Michelle I have an addictive personality.
76. I don't know if I come from a long line of alcoholics (I know I come from one) but I think that is a factor in the addictive personality thing.
77. This is why I try to avoid going on eBay or I just buy buy buy.
78. It's also why I try not to keep vodka or spirits in the house...
79. ...as when I get blue I like to drink...
80. ...which is one of the reasons I failed my A Levels as I pretty much spent the second year drunk.
81. But I'm proud of myself for not going down that route this year...
82. ...instead I got hooked on posting in this blog...
83. ...and now I feel guilty that I don't post so much.
84. But life is so busy now, and I have someone I can talk to so my random thoughts don't need to get posted for me to feel peaceful.
85. I hate when the phone rings with a random sales call and interrupts my train of thought. (as it just did).
86. I love my two cats, they make me smile all the time.
87. Well, not when Foley chewed through the modem cable.
88. It's crazy to think that only four months ago I hadn't met Anthony in person...
89. ...and now I can't imagine not knowing him.
90. I love the little glass pots that Raspberry Gu Puds come in, even though Foley just broke three all over the clean kitchen floor.
91. I decided to do this 100 thing post because I wanted a break from cleaning on my day off...
92. ...even though I'm proud of the way the bathroom looks after I scrubbed the floor.
93. Now that I'm getting near the end I'm finding it really hard to pick the last few things to put.
94. My sister bought me a My Little Pony Baby Blossom Set as a present when she was born.
95. Even though all the stuff in my living room is mine it still doesn't feel quite like my room...
96. ...but I am resisting rearranging the whole thing as I will get fed up halfway through and then it will just be a mess.
97. But I am going to throw out my pentacle picture and paint a new one for my wall.
98. Although I might do some work on my new cross stitch project, the sixth one I am working on at the moment.
99. I really love those three little dots ...
100. I nearly didn't do this because I didn't think I could think of 100 things and in fact there are lots of things I had to leave out.

(101. I hate American spell checkers that want me to write cozy instead of cosy and think that Hordern should be replaced with hardwired, Gandalf with candelabra and playgroup with pleasurable). (and where the learn function seems to be switched off so it always queries the same things).