six things meme

a long time ago, I was tagged for the six things meme by stacey. Of course, I think SHE waited for a while to do the meme, so it’s no big deal that I’m a total meme slacker. Plus, she’s on a big bike trip so she won’t know I’ve even updated for 2 weeks!
so: SIX THINGS MEME, wherein I reveal six “unusual or little known” things about myself:

1. Believe it or not, I’m really shy. I think this is a cop-out thing to reveal because I am so used to thinking of myself as shy, but I guess it’s not. so here are my words of wisdom for shy people who want to stop being shy and to interact with other human beans like you are not worried about them or yourself or what people think or how they’ll react or how they’re perceiving you: Fake it ’till you MAKE IT. seriously! it worked for me.
2. Even though I’m an engineer I’m not that great at math. I’m decent at it, and I am awfully stubborn about doing it and getting it done, but I always score much higher on verbal standardized tests than I do on the maths.
3. This is all rumor, but although we lived a comfortable and typical paycheck-to-paycheck middle class existance when I was in elementary school, apparently, my mom thought we were poor, or maybe thought we were about to become poor b/c of all the regional layoffs of engineers, and didn’t feed us very much meat. we ate a lot of beans and rice and other veggies. this isn’t a bad thing! my work girlfriend majdah’ from palestine is super impressed that I am so well versed in hummus and falafel and tabouleh (“why on earth do you know about tabouleh!? your mother cooked it for you? and she’s AMERICAN?”), and also, I don’t feel like I need to eat meat with every meal, or even every day. Which is super helpful when it’s CSA time. (we also ate a lot of raw cabbage when I was a kid, which dad says was to keep us from catching the scurvy, and mom says was b/c dad didn’t like to eat any other veggies so she fed us all that one. and when I say raw, I don’t mean in a slaw. I mean a 1/4 or an 1/8 of a cabbage, smack dab on your plate.) [[mom — feel free to add or dispute in the comments!]]
4. I love to sing the national anthem. I sang it at my graduation and again at the new president of my college’s inauguration. so, at my wee small university, apparently if you are rumored to have taken voice lessons you are approached by the head of graduation ceremonies (also head of student athletics, which were strictly on a club or intramural basis) to sing, and then you don’t have to do anything else until rehersal when you stand in a special place and then 30 minutes before the ceremony when you get to practice with the brass ensemble. Aren’t they lucky, then, that I actually am pretty good at singing the national anthem?
5. I get pretty obsessive about new hobbies. I was obsessive about persephone books, I was obsessive about knitting, I was obsessive about spinning (though I haven’t had a chance to allow myself to open my spinning wheel yet), I get obsessive about sewing the perfect outfit days before I ought to have it to wear, and I get obsessive about my CSA veggies. I’m starting to worry about where I’m going to go with this Mary Kay thing: into obsession, or safely into casual thing I do sometime?
6. and lastly: I have a stepbrother! I have 2 stepsisters! and a brother! I know that a lot of my friends are shocked when they find out that I have a stepbrother b/c I usually talk about my brother-brother ad nauseum, and my stepbro lives on the left coast and I don’t see him more than every year or two. we’re friendly, but we just don’t know each other at all.