Oh, oh, pick meme!

Da da da dum dum da da du--GAAAHHHH!!??!! Wha-!?! Who-!?! Where!?! Can a guy not loll about in blissful ignorance without being mercilessly memed? Thanks to Kelly, Gabe, and JoMoe, my days of mendacious bandying about whilst at least looking like I knew what I was doing are over. For lo, I am tagged, and I wax silly, alack, alas, and AFLAC...

At several recent gatherings with friends or family, and a few photo shoots come to think of it, misguided souls have pounced on me with no introduction whatsoever and started out a conversation with, "Say something funny!" Apparently, the disconnected (and disconcerting) stringing together of puns and snarky snippets is amusing and makes comic fodder for certain assemblages. Granted, so is tossing a cat in a blender, but from my perspective this sort of demand is the equivalent to waltzing into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and demanding that the president invade Canada. Why? Because it's amusing, of course!

On to the meat of the meme. I am supposed to assert seven random facts about myself and conclude my post by attempting to guilt-trip or blackmail seven other unfortunates into spilling their own guts with seven more facts about themselves (or else the seven curses of the seven Belching Zambian Whooping Yaks will descend upon your household to the seventh sign of the seventh sun of the seven keepers of the seven Gates of Panthuzaleh!). The presumption, I believe, is that you pass this around until ultimately all the unsolved murders, robberies, and halitosis plagues are admitted to at which point the Feds will pounce. Mind the black helicopters, folks, and watch your heads: This can only end in tears. At any rate, three hits does not mean that I'm about to list 21 embarrassingly revealing facts and 21 illustrious acquaintances. While there isn't enough bandwidth to manage my catalogue of idiosyncrasies, I doubt I KNOW that many people.

Fraud in the Factoid: The People vs. Pete (Round One) - I am not funny. I have on more than one occasion been completely stunned by the nonsense that comes out of my mouth (I'm a rather avid and unfortunate spouter of Spoonerisms, so I'm prone to dyslexic burblings that make absolutely no sense whatsoever). Due to the fact that I have opened by pie hole at the critical moment in the past, however, people assume that what escapes is necessarily funny and they commence laughing. I am grateful when that happens but really people--listen to what I say before you laugh--it's most likely not that funny. Gabe-the-patient-former-flat-mate will confirm this for you. Most of the time, he's kind enough to wait for the laughter die down before whispering, and I quote, "What in the name of all that is quasi-toothsome did you just utter?"

Fraud in the Factoid: The Insurance Company vs. Pete's Dad (Round Two) - I'm the only person I know who has been to the hospital twice in the same day for the same exact thing. For those of you who wonder, no, I did not have twins.

In other medical news, I have had stitches 12 times in 11 places on my personage on 7 different occasions with no resulting infections. I've been the ER more times than I remember thanks to a weird food allergy, and I've only broken one bone and THAT only occurred because I kicked a wall in anger after losing a terribly played game of basketball. It's the last time I remember physically perpetrating an act of violence against a wall. Ceilings beware...

Fraud in the Factoid: "Give 'em the Lazy eye" (Round three) - I have
iatrogenic oculosympathetic palsy. Knock yourselves out on that one.
To every girl who ever thought I was leering, every guy who thought I was about to pass out, and all of you who put up with me, this should at least explain the weird looks you got from me. I blame society for the rest. At least that's what they told me at the Happydale Home for the Turgidly Inane...

Is this sounding egocentric yet? It's disturbing me how frequently the term "I" appears. There's no "I" in "team," but there is a "crab hem wren" in "bench warmer."

Fraud in the Factoid: A generous tip (Round four) - Not that anybody out there didn't know this already, but I love fencing. Fencing is absolutely the coolest sport in the world. In what other sporting event can a guy don a pair of knickers and be taken seriously? All those who raised their hands for "Golf" may go soak their heads. In golf, you beat your opponent by whacking a little ball into a little cup. In fencing, you beat your opponent by whacking him repeatedly until he yells, "Uncle!" at which point you whack him again for good measure.

Fraud in the Factoid: All things bright and beautiful (Round Five) - I have had at least five fish named in my honor by my very favorite little sister, Mary Jo. I was also the proud owner of three hamsters. Boris showed up on my doorstep claiming that his original owner was allergic to him, but it is far more likely that he was evicted because he was a rude and snarky little twit with an irritating fixation on nothing at all. The lazy old coot. Kezzie was my second hamster, and I named her Kezzie because of a fascination for names with "Z's". It was also better than "Bowser." Roadkill was my last rodent friend: my sister Laura found him while she was delivering the news on her morning paper route. She deftly scooped Roadkill into her bag and brought him home to be a playmate for Kezzie.

They hated each other.

Roadkill died from blunt force trauma and Kezzie was suspected of foul play until a fingerprint analysis and chalk outline of his corpse proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that he died of mysterious causes. Kezzie lasted the longest of all of them, dying a beloved hamster. Her favorite pastimes were being thrown through the air and caught on a pillow, being saddled up to my Playmobil stagecoach to assist Black Bart in escaping the Sheriff, and escaping in the wee hours of the morning to snuggle up with my sister, Amy. They were great pals.

All of my hamsters were buried in fine plastic containers lined with the nicest fabrics generously donated for the occasion by Laura. They were all buried with full military honors in my mother's flower garden out by the shed because it hadn't occurred to me to flush them down the loo.

Fraud in the Factoid: More reasons to hate Silicon Valley (Round Six) – Silicon wrist rests are stretchy. Veeeery stretchy. So stretchy that if you peel away the plastic backing you can extend it from one end of room to another. Just- for cryin’ out loud, DON’T LET GO! I believe the incident sparking this revelation occurred shortly after the Great Memorial Day Republican Belly Flop Incident and shortly before the Avenging Ciabatta Loaf of Death Occurrence. Don’t ask, because I’m not going to tell you and the involved parties are either suspiciously unavailable or have expunged the incident from their minds.

Fraud in the Factoid: Happy? Birthday (Round Seven) – My birthday falls on the anniversary of the guillotining of Marie Antoinette, the execution of the Nuremburg war criminals, the start of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the first Million Man March. Excuse me for not hauling out the confetti and party hats, I'll be in my coffin if anyone needs me.

Fraud in the Factoid: Because seven just ain’t enough (Round Eight) –
Remember is a great organization.

And now those I am to tag.

Pope Benedict because I doubt the college of Cardinals is prone to passing this sorta thing around and the poor guy is probably feeling left out.

Scott Somerville, primarily because otherwise I'd have to got to a conference to hear seven of the most random facts I'd never heard before and probably didn't need to know but gosh I'm sure glad I know now.

Segolene Royal, because I just can't figure out how to say "loser" in French.

Lee Ann Bisculca, for various and sundry reasons, but if you know her, you'd agree it's a great choice.

The City of Oxnard because those municipal web sites are a huge waste of money otherwise.

My buddy Court who, I know gave me his blog way back when but I have now lost it, so no link to you out there in the blogosphere. He's one of my oldest pals/co-conspirators and I owe him for everything from putting up with me to introducing me to fine coffee to saving me from being another unsocialized homeschooler on homeschool skating Tuesdays to midnight rubberband gun wars, to dictatorial elections to theoretical theology... here's lookin' at ya, wherever you sign on. We'll always have Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla.

Dennis Kucinich… whaddya mean “WHAT!?!”