You probably forgot all about this by now

but I won't let that stop me.

1. What is your occupation right now? Right now? Right this minute? Typing.

2. What color are your socks right now? Barefoot right now. But the socks I just took off were grey.

3. What are you listening to right now? Piano music.

4. What was the last thing that you ate? Leftover turkey, what else?

5. Can you drive a stick shift? You betcha.

6. Last person you spoke to on the phone? My SIL.

7. Do you like the person who sent this to you? Well, I like the person who suggested I steal it. Also the person I stole it from, and the person who started it all.

8. How old are you today? 53.

9. What is your favorite sport to watch on TV? Tennis.

10. What is your favorite drink? Gin and tonic.

11. Have you ever dyed your hair? Oh, please!

12. Favorite food? Fresh-baked bread.

13. What is the last movie you watched? Cleopatra. With Elizabeth Taylor. We could only make it through half of it, though.

14. Favorite day of the year? Maybe Easter.

15. How do you vent anger? I'm a yeller.

16. What was your favorite toy as a child? Probably my rag doll.

17. What is your favorite season? Spring.

18. Cherries or Blueberries? Cherries, definitely.

19. Do you want your friends to e-mail you back? Yes, I do.

20. Who is the most likely to respond? To what?

21. Who is least likely to respond? Still baffled.

22. Living arrangements? Coherence?

23. When was the last time you cried? Too sad to say.

24. What is on the floor of your closet? Shoes and laundry.

28. Plain, cheese, or spicy hamburgers? No, thanks.

29. Favorite dog breed? Golden retriever.

30. Favorite day of the week? Sunday, probably.

31. How many states have you lived in? Five.

32. Diamonds or pearls? Neither, sadly.

33. What is your favorite flower? Lilac.

I swear to God, the Fail blog never lets me down

Newsflash

LETTER GRADES MOTIVATE CHILDREN!!!

Homeschooling Mom Flummoxed!

Ziad and Maya have a tendency to be sloppy with their schoolwork. I've tried talking to them about it. I reminded them about the solar-powered space probe that failed when its solar panels unfolded facing AWAY from the sun, all because of a small programming error. I've pointed out that if architects took this casual attitude towards arithmetic, their buildings would never be able to stand up. All to no avail.

So finally, I took Ziad's math homework and calculated the percentage he got correct.

"Oh, look!" I said, "That's a C. You're really not a C student, Ziad."

Then I explained how the grades work -- 100 to 90 percent is an A, 80 to 89 is a B, and so on. No grading on a curve here. (Although, of course, the problem of how you would generate a curve with a class of 1 is an interesting exercise. Kind of a koan.) To my surprise, he displayed an unexpected enthusiasm for this concept. And now, guess what? It's all As, all the time. Goodbye, silly copying errors. So long, writing 2 times 3 equals 5 when you know perfectly well it's 6. And now Maya wants letter grades, too.

What an eye-opener.

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Ziad is experimenting with joke writing. It's been a while since his debut effort, the fairly predictable

Q: What does a wizard say when he falls of a cliff?
A: Abracadabraaaaaaaaaaa!

He kept with it, though, and a recent electronics class inspired

Q: What is a volmeter for?
A: You use it when you're parking your volts.

I think that one's my personal favorite -- it still makes me laugh.

I guess he's been reading more Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys than I realized, because recently he tried out

Q: What do you call a short mystery?
A: A briefcase.

Leading up to a recent breakfast table conversation.

Ziad: What's black and red all over?

Maya: A zebra with a sunburn.

Ziad: No, that's black and WHITE and red all over.

Maya: Well, the sunburn covered the white part.

Ziad: Well, anyway, that's not right.

Maya: OK, what?

Ziad: A burned newspaper.

Maya: But you can't READ a burned newspaper.

Ziad: Well, they read it before it was burned.

Maya: Then what they read is not what you asked.

Score one for Maya, I think.

But Ziad never gives up. Just the other day, when his guitar teacher mentioned something about a general rule in music, Ziad asked him, "Well, then what's a soldier rule?" Sometimes it's hard to get anything done with a boy who views any spoken utterance as setup for a pun. I think he gets it from his grandfather.

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