Five things...

1. I eat the food on my plate in order of deliciousness, from icky to exquisite (true, but it's here for homage-ical reasons).
2. Despite being born and raised in the Kay-Dub, I have never been to an Oktoberfest celebration (it's now more important to me to maintain this streak than to actually attend an Oktoberfest event).
3. When I was five years old, some older kids thought it would be cool to teach and make me repeat several swears. My sister found out about this and blackmailed me for nearly seven years (No, I wasn't a momma's boy; I just didn't want to see the "evil eye" and/or "expression of disappointment" - they always made me fold faster than Superman on laundry day :).
4. I used to play the viola in a quartet. It was a pretty sweet gig.
5. For Christmas one year, my sister and I decided to give our mom an updated photograph of the two of us (you know, a photograph where there are no brown and orange colour combinations and no one is sporting a "Dukes of Hazzard" t-shirt with the name "Colin" on the back written in those iron-on sparkly letters - man, I miss that shirt :).
   
   Anyway, my sister had a coupon to Sears Photo, so we decided to go there. The photographer greeted us and showed us to the studio. She then began to place my sister and I into some strange poses: my sister and I were facing each other, I had my hands around her waist and she had her hand on my chest. The photographer continued to put us in some strange poses. My sister and I were starting to feel very uncomfortable and a little disturbed, but we didn't say anything because hey, she was the photographer; she had the certificate of achievement in photography from the Sally Struther's study-at-home program hanging on the wall - she was the one with the credentials.
   
   So after all the pictures were taken, the photographer uploaded the photos to a computer so that my sister and I could review them. The photographer told us that we could choose from a selection of backgrounds and write a short statement on the border. So, the photographer chose the background with a rose and a wedding band on it. She then proceeded to type "We're Engaged!!!" (yes, the three exclamation points were hers, not mine).
   
   I don't remember much after that because I blacked out once I read the computer screen :). It was an awkward and embarrassing (for us and the photographer) couple of minutes after that. My sister and I didn't choose a background, quickly ordered prints of the least disturbing poses and then got The. Hell. Outta. There.
   
   On the bright side, I got a funny story out of it and all it cost my sister and I were several years of therapy.