you can't have everything ... where would you put it?

1. Name one thing that is beautiful about your body: my skin is in good shape
2. Name one thing that is ugly about your body: my fingernails are a disgrace
3. Name one thing that is beautiful about your mind: I'm an exceptional observer
4. Name one thing that is ugly about your mind: sometimes I can't--or won't--let go of what I've witnessed
5. Who was the last person you were rude to? someone at work. I could say it's because she's never once been decent to me, but that's really no excuse for my choices. I just don't like her.
6. Are your elbows soft? yes. There's a little healing blister on one of them (actually a rug-burn) from Pilates, but otherwise they're great
7. Are you ticklish? as if I'd say so?
8. Are you awkward or graceful? physically not too bad, but certainly not "graceful." Socially, I'm fairly awkward except around the people with whom I'm the very closest, and even then I know that some of the perceived grace is actually acceptance and affection.
9. Do you wear glasses/contacts? I do
10. If you wear contacts, what's the longest you have ever left them in your eyes? a couple, maybe 3 days? It's hard to say; college was bad for that. They've been in about 12 hours at this point and are reaching the plastic-wrap stage.
11. What's going on where you are right now? almost nothing. I'm on the couch in the front room, feet up on the coffee table. The only sound in the house is my fingers on the keys. Traffic is pretty heavy on the highway, which is roughly 1/2 mile away, running parallel to the street where my house is. I can hear the cars, probably trucks, moving. Otherwise, all is quiet.
12. What is your favorite thing to touch? keeping it clean...I'll say my friends' cats' fur
13. What is your favorite kind of incense? ugh, please no. It's a guaranteed headache.
14. What relaxes you? massage. A good book. A warm shower.
15. How much time have you wasted? time is never wasted. It just is.
16. How do you afford your rock and roll lifestyle? diligent focus on my rock 'n roll career, of course
17. What does teen spirit smell like? deodorant
18. Do you mostly listen or hear? like everyone on the planet, I only listen to a tiny subset of what I hear
19. Look or see? again, along with everyone else, I only see a portion of what I look at
20. Do you comprehend all the things you read? I don't believe that there is any way to know that. I mean, sometimes it's obvious; if I read a book of advanced physics in written in German, then I'm not going to comprehend it. But if I'm reading in my native language, about a subject that I generally understand? Then any failure is as likely due to mood, inattention, etc. as it is to actual lack of comprehension.
21. Is it necessary to be repetitive in order to be creative? I think so. Creativity requires some training, some facility with the tools of the trade, and the ability to transcend the ordinary.
    Repetition, in the sense of practice or study, allows that.
22. Do you control your attitude or does it control you? sometimes, yes
23. Are your relationships mostly passion or conversation? where appropriate, I have each. My work relationships are primarily conversation, and thank God for that. A lot of those people wouldn't appreciate passion if it walked up and bit them on the face. But, in my real life? There's passion everywhere. Maybe it's not interacting with me that brings it out (please and thank you) but it's hard for me to be true friends or feel real kinship with someone who is unable to feel it.
24. Do you do what needs to be done regardless of the consequences? in certain circumstances, I do. Prehaps to a greater extent than makes people comfortable sometimes.
25. Is money how you keep score? it is in money games
26. Who can you do everything or nothing with and still have the best time? is this a riddle? The answer would be "myself," right?
    My FRIENDS, of course. I have a few. Sometimes so many that I feel pulled in too many different directions and need to re-center myself. (A state which simultaneously makes me feel incredibly grateful and also selfish.)
27. Just because you're angry, does that give you the right to be cruel? no one has the "right" to be cruel
28. What is maturity and where does it come from? time. It's just time.
29. Who is the maturest person you know? I'm fairly certain that 'mature' is an absolute, like 'dead' or 'pregnant.' Once one has matured (or died, or become pregnant), there is no turning back. As such, the concept allows for no hierarchy.
30. Who is the most immature person you know? ahh, there's the rub. It's easy to pick that one out. That's a tie between my niece and the person to whom I report in my current position.
    Each is old enough to know better, selfish, entitled, bratty, and unlikely to be held accountable by those who've facilitated the attainment of the position they currently hold.
31. If there was a fire and you could only rescue one thing from your room (all people and pets have escaped on their own, even goldfish) what would it be? this has been considered in detail elsewhere in the blog, in this post--during a discussion of a book that I still very highly recommend.
32. If you could, what 3 albums would you force everyone to remove from his or her CD collections? other peoples' music collections bring them happiness. As long as it's not being foisted on me, what do I care? For what it's worth, my personal preference does not extend to bluegrass or opera, but that hardly makes me a critic.
33. Does Marilyn Manson scare you or bore you? neither
34. What do you think of the Insane Clown Posse? ICP reminds me of George, whom I miss
35. What's the best movie about high school? The Breakfast Club
36. Do you like Michael Jackson better in the 80's, 90's, or today? I'm going to go with anything but today
37. Is choosing a different store to shop in from most people really making a statement? it is if there's a statement to be made there. For instance, choosing to support small proprietorships rather than larger corporations can make a real difference in keeping money in your own town. Using a co-op grocery can mean buying from local farmers and vendors who in turn will use their profits to reinvest in the area. Buying from ethical companies rather than the sweatshop/nasty chemical/ties to the mob types puts an economic spin on a political argument. There are ways to "make a statement" that go beyond, I think, the trite sense implied in the question.
38. What's the riskiest thing you've ever done? loved
39. Have you ever ridden in a car while the driver had been drinking? many, many times
40. Who needs to get a life? every damned one of us
41. Do write on yourself with pens? at least twice a day every day at work, but only because I use big crappy highlighters
42. What should be different about high school curriculum? I think that people like me, who are full of opinions but know nothing about education from the educator's standpoint, should stay the hell out of it
43. Right now, are you exactly the way you want to be? of course not. 100% of anything would be death of the spirit. Anyway, I'm at least 20 pounds overweight, I'm terribly out of shape (as indicated by the unbelievably sore muscles I've got from exercising this week--I've been doing a workout that was an ingrained part of my routine a few years ago that I'd forgotten was so intense),
    and I'm almost hilariously broke.
44. Who can save you from yourself? only me
45. Are you a responsible person? in a lot of ways, yes. In some ways, I ought to be locked in a cage.
46. "It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious." [Oscar Wilde]
    Do you agree? uhm, no. Murderers are bad, not 'tedious.' People who selflessly devote their lives to charity work are good, not 'charming.' And, for that matter, the great majority of us are neither "good" or "bad," either. Somewhere in between is where we all reside.
47. How many greatest hits albums do you own? too many to count
48. Are you at risk for a.i.d.s.? aren't we all, in some sense? I'm not going out looking for it, it's safe to say.
49. Do you want to have it all? no. (See title quotation.)
50. Do you collect green pictures of dead presidents? as much as I'd like to, they seem to prefer to run through my hands like water

[From the 5000-question meme; this is the second half of the tenth part. The title quotation is by Steven Wright.]