Image from Pixabay. Because pretty.
Answer’s to Jo’s weekly questions over at Dreamwidth.
18. Using only one word per person, what was your first impression of each person present with you now?
I’m alone so can’t answer this.
19. What books on your shelf are begging to be read?
Two books from the library: the crime novel by Anna Jansson I’m a little more than half-way through right now, and another crime novel by Elle Griffiths, because they’re new enough that other people are waiting for them and am likely unable to renew them!
20. What do you do if you can’t sleep at night? Do you count sheep, toss and turn, or get up and try to do something productive?
I suffer from insomnia and bad quality/short sleep; I’m always sleep deprived and tired. I usually try to rest anyway, to get myself quiet and peaceful because I’ve noticed that even if I can’t sleep, I function better the next day if I can rest.
21. Which do you do more often: hum or whistle?
I can’t whistle so humming wins… but I rarely do that either.
22. When you’re alone at home, do you wear shoes, socks, slippers, or go barefoot?
Barefoot if it’s summer, socks if it’s winter. Indoor shoes aren’t a thing here: it’s considered the epitome of rude to wear shoes inside and everyone automatically takes them off right after stepping through the front door, even people like plumbers unless you specifically tell them that they can keep their shoes on. Some people, usually grandmas and grandpas, wear slippers.
23. Who’s the biggest “pack rat” you know?
Myself, I think. Only with certain types of items of which books is the most common. I can’t go to book stores or book fairs because they’re much too dangerous places to me – I always want to BUY ALL THE BOOKS!!!! and I don’t have enough physical space anymore to buy new ones.
24. What is your most unusual nighttime or morning ritual?
I don’t have a morning ritual, but my nighttime ritual is that I must read fiction for at least 10 minutes before turning out the lights. Sometimes this is very hard when I’m so tired my eyes have trouble staying open, but if I don’t read for at least ten minutes, even a book I’ve read a hundred times times already, I’ll feel out of kilter all day the next day.
25. How do you get rid of pesky phone calls from telemarketers/scam callers?
My country has this Robinson list that you can put your number on, and reputable telemarketers respect it and don’t call. The telemarketer calls really slowed down when I added my number about a decade ago: now I only get about two or three calls a year.
A new phenomenon is scam callers from abroad – they speak really, really bad English so it’s easy to know they’re scammers immediately: because no service I use calls me in English especially not without me agreeing to it beforehand and knowing to expect the call on a certain day at the certain hour. And domestic services call me only in Finnish. Foreing services I use contact me via e-mail. So I hang up right away when somebody starts to talk bad English on the other end. The first few I got said they’re calling from Microsoft and have I noticed my Windows has been hijacked. I got these scammer calls four or five times last year, or was it the year before, but haven’t gotten them now for a long while. The scam was in the news here and warned about everywhere.
26. Have you ever square-danced or line-danced? When was the last time you did any sort of dancing (not counting when alone in your home!)?
Nope and nope. In school. I don’t care the sort of places and/or events where dancing happens because they’re too crowded and LOUD and I’m always uncomfortable when forced to go into one and only want to go home.
27. When you leave a room, do you turn the lights off behind you or keep the lights on throughout your house most of the time?
The kitchen has the light on all the time when I’m up (except when I’m having a migraine attack that’s when all the lights are off) – the kitchen and living room is one long room, and the light in kitchen lights the living room portion as well just right for me because I can’t handle full on brightness of lights (I have very light sensitive eyes, always have had; it’s probably to do with the migraine). I do have a light in the living room as well but the only time it’s on is when I’m dusting and/or vacuuming. I also usually keep my night light on in the bedroom because I often go read in the bed during the day and don’t feel like turning it on and off all the time. This last one I’m actively trying to change as of two weeks ago to putting the light out every time I’m not there to save on the electricity bill because the price of electricity is going up so much.
When I’m staying at my Mom’s, whose apartment has more separate rooms and a clear difference between the kitchen and the living room unlike I do, I do turn off lights if I don’t go back to the room immediately after just fetching something from somewhere else or something like that. Because that’s how they do things there, and guess I’ve just picked up their habits while I’m there.
28. How frequently do you purchase lottery tickets?
Really randomly and rarely. I haven’t bought any for the last 12+ months. I usually transfer 10 euros to Veikkaus account, and then buy from that over several months until it runs out. Then the next time I do it might be a year or two later. I’m not really interested in lottery, I forget it exists and also I don’t have the money usually to waste money like that. But it’s nice to dream about not having money problems so very occasionally I do like to buy some lottery tickets because that’s the most likely way for that to happen to me.
29. Have you ever been an audience member for any television shows? Which ones? If you haven’t, would you like to be? For which shows?
Nope and nope.
30. When was the last time you sat on a park bench for more than ten minutes? Describe the occasion.
I can’t remember. I’m not a park person these days and there aren’t any “park” parks near me and to go to a proper park, I’d have to make an effort and a special trip. So before I got ill back in 2008. I’m in too much pain and too tired to make a trip to a park, walk + spend time around in the park, and then to make another trip back and also, such a trip would take out all my energy for 2-3 days after. So no parks for me! Back when I was healthy, I wasn’t much of a park person then either – I wouldn’t go to a park just to spend time, I’d be walking through it on the way somewhere. Usually with my best friend. But we would sit on the benches if time allowed and the sun wasn’t too hot. But yeah, parks haven’t ever really been a feature in my life.
Now sitting on a bench while going out for a little stroll on a little walking path on the field or the woods five minutes from my home? Sign me up! No particular occasion but it was in the spring before the temperatures got too hot. I try take take 2-3 stroll outside every week in the fall/winter/spring and a lot of the walking paths around here have benches along them every now and then. I like to sit on one, drink from my water bottle and watch the dogs that hopefully go by! Sitting a spell also lets me make a little longer stroll, if I have to walk without rest, it’d have to be a shorter walk to avoid wiping me out for for the rest of the day.
31. When something is funny, do you usually laugh raucously, hiss, snort, chuckle quietly to yourself, or smile and nudge the person next to you?
Chuckle quietly to myself because I’m usually alone. But if I’m with a friend or my Mom, I snort or laugh outloud – not raucously (it’s rarely that funny) and depends on the kind of funny it is which reaction it is. I also nudge the other person if they haven’t noticed it yet.