Average Jane, The Basics

Because it's NaBloPoMo and I'm getting lots of new visitors, I thought I'd steal Mocha Momma's idea and write a post to introduce myself to anyone who hasn't been keeping up with my blog since 2004. Keith, you can probably skip this one.

I am the oldest of the two children in my family. My sister and I fought non-stop when we were growing up, but now we're best friends. I don't have any kids, but I love hanging out with my niece and nephew and watching them turn into very cool people.

My husband is a long-haired drummer dude who runs a recording studio and otherwise makes his living playing in bands. We'll have been married 15 years next month and we get along exceedingly well despite some differences in political and philosophical outlook.

Ever since I was a little kid, I've been crazy about cats. I have four of them right now, which is my "I don't want to turn into a crazy cat lady" limit. One lives in the recording studio and the rest live downstairs in the main part of our house. I get my additional cat fix by volunteering with an animal rescue group and at a low-cost spay and neuter clinic.

I love to cook and bake, but I'm not home to do so very often. I also keep the baking to a minimum because my husband is diabetic and it's best not to have sweets around the house too often. I still go all out during the holidays and you'll find a bunch of my favorite recipes in the sidebar to the right.

My go-to recipes when I need something quick for a party are the brownies and the cheese ball. I was happy to learn yesterday that pomegranates have arrived in the stores, so I'll be making pomegranate salsa as often as I can while the fruit is in season.

Ever since I was a teenager I've been singing in various rock bands. Most of them have been cover bands, but I was in an original alternative band in the early 1990s called Radio Sunday, and a hard rock original band called Dark Crucible a few years ago. I'm currently in a rock cover band called Rock Machine. We just finished recording our demo and it looks like our first gig will be December 12th.

One of the reasons I've taken to blogging and Twitter so enthusiastically is that I love meeting new people. I've attended the BlogHer Conference every year since it began and I'm already signed up for 2010. I often attend Kansas City area blogger meetups and tweetups, and I belong to our huge Kansas City Social Media Club. It's amazing how many wonderful friends I've gained, some right in my neighborhood and some on the other side of the globe.

Reading is one of my favorite activities that I don't have as much time for as I'd like (probably because I spend most of my book reading time surfing the 'net and reading blogs). I'm loosely attached to at least four different book clubs right now, so that gives me some extra incentive. Most of the books in my permanent collection have some kind of fantasy or science fiction element: Lord of the Rings, the Harry Potter Series, the Oz books, etc., and yet I seem so down-to-earth!

I really enjoy doing yoga and my company offers classes at lunchtime on Mondays and Wednesdays, which I attend whenever I have time. My sister has a yoga studio, but I rarely take classes there because it's too far away. However, I will be going there on Saturday for a capoeira workshop because the instructor is one of my friends and I introduced them.

If you've read this far, you know that I can't write anything in brief. I'm working on it!

Comments

[Laurie]

So funny that you wrote about capoeira today. Just this morning, I saw that our local community centre is offering a class for all ages (5 to adult, anyway) and my 6yo and I are going to going to sign up. I had never heard of capoeira before this morning.
But since D. is loves his tae kwon do class and loves to dance even more, this could be perfect for him. And I could be in real trouble...

[Ella]

Loved this! Thanks for the summary!