Blog Peep Questions: Round 4

Welcome to your 4th installment of:

Who is your favorite superhero?
Oh, gosh… I honestly can’t claim to know superheroes or their back stories well enough to tell you a favorite. I did, however, have a really fun conversation a few years ago about superpowers with my niece Anna. We were sitting on my parents’ back porch after having just stuffed ourselves with s’mores, trying to decide what superpower would be the best one to have.

It pretty much came down to super-hearing, invisibility, flying and mind-reading. She was somewhat torn between invisibility and flying, but I said flying hands-down. A small part of it was the physical thing… since I’m not moving much anymore it seemed like it would be a crazy-good rush to go as fast as I wanted, anywhere I wanted. But mostly, I just didn’t want to know what people really thought about when I wasn’t around.

I mean, whether you have super-hearing, are invisible or can read minds, you are inevitably going to find out what people probably never intended you to know. I wish I could say it was about respecting people’s privacy but, in truth, it’s because I would drive myself crazy trying to please everyone and fix what they thought was bad about me.

I don’t have thick enough skin for that!!! So, flying it is. I’ll let you know if I ever master it. :)

What did you study in college?
It took me awhile to decide on a major, actually. My problem was that I enjoyed way too many things.

I started off as a biology major. One of my favorite classes in high school was Advanced Biology where we got to dissect cats and do all these great experiments. I know it sounds creepy, but I got really into it. I took those classes for a few semesters but it just didn’t feel like something I was going to enjoy studying for the rest of my life.

I loved my psychology class and took a few sociology courses that I also really, really enjoyed. But it was during one of the sociology classes that my professor handed a research paper back to me and commented that it would be good to keep on file if I wanted to expand it for publishing. I started to realize that the reasons I loved those classes were because there were very few tests, a whole lot of research and a whole lot of writing. The next semester I took a class called Literature and Psychoanalysis and I felt like a lightening bolt had hit me. I have honestly never enjoyed anything more than taking pieces of literature and analyzing the characters’ meanings, intentions and motivations. It was fantastic.

So, I became an English major. I had started with a Business minor, realized how much math was involved when I took Statistics, dropped that course and decided on a Business Communications minor. SO much better. I also had a Professional Writing minor and everyone told me I would never get a job unless I went into teaching, but thank goodness they were wrong! I really loved my college classes and sometimes wish I could sit in the back of a good literature class again just to hear the discussions.

How do you let your dog out to potty if you can’t go outside?
Good question! Actually, Riley has never had to go outside because I litter trained him. Yes, there is litter for dogs and it is the most fantastic invention ever!

When I first decided to get a dog, I had three criteria that had to be met: he couldn’t shed, I didn’t want him to smell like a dog and he had to be small enough to litter train. Petco makes a great brand of dog litter that works great for us, if you’re interested in trying it for your pup.

This is a psychedelic photo I took of Riley jumping out of his litter box  for his Week in the Life post last year. It’s just a little wicker enclosure with his litter box inside, tucked away in my hallway.

It’s not to be confused with his cute matching wicker kennel where he goes to pout or contemplate the complexities of life. Thankfully he doesn’t confuse the two, either!

Although he is litter trained, anytime he has gone outside for walks he makes up for the fact that he’s treated like a cat inside by marking every tree, bush, blade of grass and stray rock that crosses his path. He is nothing if not an alpha dog.

My neighbor Candace and I are bracing ourselves for the day he walks up and marks on her cute little dog, Martini. She’s the only dog Riley likes and we wouldn’t put it past him to make sure the whole world knows she’s his.

Men.

Since you do digital scrapping, have you turned your handwriting into a font?
Ok, so I know I answered this question in a previous post, but I have an update for you. I told you previously about having one of my handwriting styles made into a font that you could download [Pea Frankie]. It’s the style of writing I used when I did paper scrapbooking for a clean and consistent look, and I took the opportunity to have it made into a font when I started scrapbooking digitally.

After producing that font she asked if I wanted to do another style, so I sent her my more normal, everyday handwriting. I totally forgot about it until I got an email from her a few weeks ago with the new font completed. She now has it up on her site where you can download it as well [Pea Sara Print].

The Pea Frankie font is what I used to write “Blog Peep Questions” in the logo at the start of this post, and Pea Sara Print is used in the tagline of that logo, as well as all the headings on the blog posts and sidebar. If you like them, feel free to download away!

Ok, that’s it for today. I had planned on answering a lot more questions, but apparently I’m completely incapable of giving short answers.

But I’m guessing you all knew that about me by now, right? :)