Thank you Kat for nominating me for this months and months ago! Finally – I yield up my answers and trivia!
The Rules
- Acknowledge the person who nominated you!
- Answer the 11 questions Kat at The Lily Cafe asked me about blogging.
- 11 random facts about yourself.
- Nominate 5-11 bloggers.
- Ask nominated bloggers 11 questions.
11 Questions from Kat, and my 11 dubious answers.
What book has had the biggest impact on you?
Probably The Hobbit, it’s the reason I write fantasy. If not it then Nine Princes in Amber, as it made the idea of writing fantasy sexy. Or Heir of Sea and Fire, it made me think dreams could be spun into words. They’re my fantasy trifecta. A Scanner Darkly blew my mind. Moby Dick recently transformed from an oddity I was reading to get through into a thing of wonderment, something that has never happened to me before. Anthony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare – failure has never been so beautiful. The Wife of Bath’s Tale by Chaucer, a character so vivid, so real, so far from us and yet so immediate. Many others that have inspired dreams, instructed, puzzled, challenged. So not one book.
What animal would you want to be for a day and why?
Dolphin. So I can know those guys speak a complex language and are smart. And then feel ashamed at how we are trashing their world.
What is your favorite kind of music?
Heavy Metal. I love many others but 70s rock to 80s metal was what I was a pre-angsty teen to, and then an actual angsty teen to, so despite many other love affairs, (I loved me the gothic music as an agnsty teen also) it has to be metal.
Have you ever had a kitchen disaster? If so, what was it?
Yes. One day the kitchen ceiling fell in. That sucked.
If you could go anywhere in the universe, on Earth or otherwise, where would you go?
Just off the shoulder of Orion, because it isn’t exactly there. Though I’m sure someone somewhere has calculated a position for it. (Which one do I want to visit though? Obviously the one with the attack ships on fire…) You can appreciate the vastness of the universe from your back yard, but sometimes I’d like to be floating in it in a way far more immediate and personal than as a passenger on our iron-cored rock-vessel.
What is your favorite holiday?
My wife. Italy. Art, food, history, sunlight.
Dog or cat? Fish?
Fish, when I was a kid. Rent a dog too as a kid, and I loved them. (Holidays with my Aunt.) Now – cat.
Would you rather live on a mountain or in the desert?
I kind of do live in a desert, given Colorado’s official semi-arid designation, and near to the mountains. The poetical in me would love to be a mountain dwelling hermit. The practical says it would be an annoying drive in winter to Walmart for supplies. How romance crushing is that?
What is your favorite kind of dessert?
All of them. I have a significant sweet tooth. Not unusual for Scots – we make a virtue out of creating pure sugar confections.
What is your favorite kind of post to write?
The ones where I share an insight, even if fleeting, into what I do or why in writing. Being moderately amusing is also a plus.
What advice would you give to other bloggers?
Keep going and expect nothing. Do it for yourself, you’ll enjoy it more.
11 Random facts.
1) I, like Kat from the lily café, love lighthouses. I had a romantic dream of living in one in Galway in Ireland for many years. There was going to be a rowboat, and cable-knit sweaters. Pity I’m no sailor.
2) I’m no sailor. But I don’t get seasick.
3) Though a cruise ship did make me a tad queasy.
4) I was once known as the buffet slayer.
5) I have learned how to waltz three times.
6) I like walking in the rain.
7) I used to collect Tolkien calendars. Like all my collections, it is incomplete.
8) I am ranked a 7/9 in APA pool. I’m okay. It took a lot of work to get to those rankings, and there are many many players far more skilled than I out there.
9) I genuinely enjoy playing people at pool who are better than me.
10) At first.
11) I never liked how it was so much harder to gain craft than strength when playing Talisman. We changed the rules so you gained both the same way. (I think later editions went down that road too.) Loved that game, but it did get to be a boring grind after a while.
My Nominees
And really anyone else who would like to join in – feel free to do so!
My Eleven questions
1) What was your favourite playground game?
2) When you think of the sea, where are you?
3) What is your favourite genre of writing?
4) Why?
5) When is your favourite period of writing?
6) Why?
7) Tidy writing space messy writing space, where do you fall on that continuum?
8) Have you ever sung in public?
9) Do you think a door can truly ever be a jar? (I know, I just went there. Invent a question and answer it here: do as you will.)
10) Most disappointing sequel you’ve ever experienced – book, movie, TV show seasons, take your pick. Mine is of course Highlander 2. Gah.
11) If you could wake up in one random other country on earth, a real one, tomorrow, which country would you like to wake up in (and why!)?
Roderick T. Macdonald 
The Hobbit. God I loved this book! (my first D&D character… at age 10… or whenever it was, was called Thorin Oakenshield, I thought he was hard done by… ha ha… I always felt simpatico)
I have a significant soft spot for the dwarves. One day I intend to write a high fantasy story with dwarves front and centre. One day…
One day… when you are long in the beard…