i got an award - woohoo!

teehee. i got an award from my good buddy Daddy Hawk over at Preachers and Horse Thieves.


 





HOW TO ACCEPT THE AWARD: The Liebster Blog Award is a way to recognize blogs who have less than 200 followers.  Liebster is a German word that means beloved and valued.  Here are the rules for accepting the award:

1.      Thank the person who nominated you and include a link back to their blog.

2.      List 11 random facts about yourself.

3.      Answer the 11 questions given to you.

4.      Create 11 questions for the bloggers you nominate.

5.      Choose 11 bloggers with 200 or fewer followers to nominate and include links to their blogs.

6.      Go to each blogger's page and let them know you have nominated them. 

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allright - 11 random facts, here goes:

1. my mother is an ex-communicated Jehovah's Witness. she was ex-communicated because she married my father, an athiest. the two of them brought me to the Salvation Army when i was 4 to have me baptized...they lied and said i was 5 to get me into school early (at that time you could still register to start school with a baptism certificate!). i constantly had teachers say "children...today is kymber's birthday". and i would be like - no, today isn't my birthday. it was quite confusing!

2. my parents used to tie one of my feet to the bed with a long rope because i slept-walked. my father regularly had to go driving around our community in the middle of the night to find me. my parents regularly got phone calls in the middle of the night from people 3 or 4 streets away saying that they had found me. hence the rope and being tied to the bed!

3. i was a competitive gymnast and a competitive cheerleader. i was a really good ice-dance skater but had to give it up due to gymnastics and cheerleading.

4. because i started school at the age of 4, and skipped grade 5 - i ended up being 12, almost 13, in grad 10.....NOT FUN!

5. i graduated high school when i was 15 and proceeded to college 3 provinces away. had no friends (how many 19yr olds want to hang out with a 15 yr old?!?!?!?), and worked 3 fast food jobs. sometimes i was so tired after a day of school and closing a fast food place the night before - that i showed up at McDonald's with my Arby's outfit, or showed up at Burger King with my McDonald's outfit - it was a really sh*tty 2 yrs of my life. a blur. i really don't remember much of it.

6.  when i finished college with a $3,500 student loan, my father gave me nothing but hell for 2 weeks about owing the government and possibly going to jail. so i joined the military. and paid off my student loan is just under 6 months. take that Dad!

7. when i went to basic training, i was still under contract with a hair modelling agency in Halifax called SHE. i still had two hair shows to attend, in Halifax, which was near Cornwallis, my basic training base. the recruiters told me it would be no problem. well....it was a problem! i had to leave Cornwallis the first 2 weekends of basic training to attend the hair shows. my instructors were not amused to say the least! when i landed in Cornwallis, i had long, dyed red hair that were not allowed to cut until after my hair shows. all of the girls in Cornwallis were taken to get "the Cornwallis bob" but they weren't allowed to cut my hair. after my first hair show, i came back with a shoulder-length, silver-blonde layered cut. after my second hair show, i came back with a tousled, neck-length midnight-blue cut. i wasn't back in the barracks for more than 20 minutes when they took me to the CanEx barber and he gave me an odd, kinda weird short cut. such is life i guess.

8. i was 76lbs when i landed in Cornwallis and the maxi-doc told me that i better break 80lbs by the end of third week or they were sending me home. i actually lost weight in Cornwallis because a few of the instructors put me on weapons guard duty during meal times and didn't give me a relief to be able to go in and get my food. but the girls in my platoon all snuck food out of the mess and my MCpl brought food in the evenings.

9. i loved attending the Canadian Forces pilot course for Korean linguistics. i originally wanted to learn Russian, then changed it to Arabic, but i feel especially grateful that i was on the pilot course for Korean. i loved my Korean teacher and she loved me. she called me "jjak-eun-ahk-ma" - which translates into "little devil". that was my nickname and she loved calling me that! she gave me my Korean name, which is "sayt-byull" which means "special star" and it really refers to the planet Venus which is a bright orange globe in the sky in Korea during the month of October, and can be seen day or night.

10. my favourite place that i ever worked was at the Communications Centre for the Solicitor General of Canada (now PSEPC). the Solicitor General was mandated with Public Safety, in charge of the RCMP and CSIS, and in charge of establishing all policies and procedures for law enforcement in Canada. i worked with a great group of communications officers. and then 9/11 happened. some of you may remember my previous posts about us being responsible for landing over 650 planes that couldn't land in the US, in Canada. we worked round the clock and got all of those planes, and passengers safely landed. i feel that i have a really funny connection to that horrible tragedy because i was so involved....and so proud that Canada did what we did. i felt honoured to work with such caring people. they got me a barbie cake when i left there to go to FINTRAC. they were awesome!

11. i am a trained aerobics instructor and a trained ball-room dancer. after i did my trades training (QL3's) in Kingston, and then was posted to Ottawa, i was a part-time ballroom dance instructor at the Fred Astaire Dance Studios - bahahahahahah! i loved it!

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okay then, so here are Daddy Hawk's questions (if you are still reading!):

Who is your favorite author and why?
i honestly couldn't name one. during different periods of my life, i used to love and have a favourite author. but then you grow and change and someone else takes their place. if i had to name a favourite poet - hands down, without question - --- the amazing T.S. Eliot. 

but to be fair, i love Oscar Wilde, too. "we are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars". 


What is your favorite adult beverage?
oh that's an easy one....the only adult beverage i ever consume is Lindeman's Bin 50, Shiraz. 




Which Biblical verse (or other spiritual text quote) is the most meaningful to you and why? 

there are two and they are inter-connected:
 Psalm 147:4 - "He counts the number of the stars; He gives names to all of them."
 and
Isaiah 40:26 - Lift up your eyes on high
And see who has created these stars
The One who leads forth their host by number,
He calls them all by name..." 

i like those quotes because it gives me a sense of peace, if He created and named all of the stars, then he has no problem keeping up with who we are. 


What’s the coolest, bestest, most exciting thing you’ve ever done?
how about the coldest thing i have ever done? i did a polar bear dip in the arctic ocean. which is basically running to a hole in the arctic ocean, jumping in, and then jumping out screaming!!! i also did the polar bear roll - which is wearing a bathing suit and rolling down a glacier in the arctic! coolest tho would be a tie between flying a Herc-C130, flying from the arctic to greenland. the other was firing a 50cal machine gun, on what i think was a stryker combat vehicle (not sure tho - it wasn't as big as a tank but it was bigger than a hummer and had a turret! anyone have any idea what i might have ridden on?). but man - it was awesome! and so were the 2 guys helping me fire that crazy baby!

What is your favorite weapon and why?


well, let's just say that it isn't an FNC1, which is what i was trained on in basic training. but i would have to say that anything that Kimber makes - teehee. those would be my faves. for obvious reasons!


What is your favorite sport in which to participate (watching it on TV from the sofa does not count)?

gardening, napping, reading, cooking, jumping into the river and then being the fastest one out while screaming like a banshee....kissing cats, kissing jambaloney, reading blogs - yep - that's about all of them!

At what event (past, present, real or fictional) would you want to be present and why?

geeze-louise - too many to name! i could be here all night and i have already been here for most of the afternoon!


What is the weirdest food combination that you like at which others raise an eyebrow?

i had to ask jambaloney for clarification - i couldn't think of any weird food combinations. and he agreed. i don't have any. hmmmm - now i feel like i need one or two!

What is your biggest hypocrisy or double standard?


i can't stand when people talk loud. i really can't stand it! but guess who talks really, really loudly when they feel they have a point to make? you guessed it. my bad!

What was your first car and would you own it again?

 my friend gave me his Dodge Dakota Sport for a while...to look after while he was overseas. but the very first vehicle i ever owned was a Yamaha Vino - 50cc scooter. oh i loved that baby! i drove it to work for 6yrs from March until December. i was something of a celebrity with the school kids waiting at bus stops on my drive to work. they would wave, i would honk a little "beep-beep" and they loved it. i loved it more. one of the security officers at work had this tricked-out Harley like you wouldn't believe. when i would come into work, he would say "live to ride, sista. live to ride!". i loved that scooter!

Which unfulfilled dream of yours do you most want to achieve in your lifetime and why?

 now see, this one is a hard one for me. i always dreamed of coming home, to this exact county, and be accepted by the community, and have friends and family. that dream has been fulfilled!

although i always thought that i would live my life alone, because of my career and travel, and i was ok with that - still, i always dreamed i would find my soulmate. and that dream has been fulfilled!

i always dreamed, once the internet came out, that i could find like-minded people with whom i could learn from and share with - and that dream has been fulfilled!

i really don't have any dreams any more. i dream to have a good and prosperous life, i dream to do good, i dream to be good - but those things are already within my reach - i try to live those dreams daily. and can do so if i put my mind to it. 

i don't have any unfulfilled dreams. i only have dreams for the future!

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okay...this has taken over an hour but maybe, like jambaloney says, i overdo things. but i feel that if someone nominates you for an award, tells you to list random things about yourself, and then asks 11 questions - well, i take that seriously!

tomorrow i will do a post and nominate 11 fellow bloggers and come up with 11 questions. that gives all of you in our blogroll the chance to delete your blog so that i can't come and nominate you - bahahahahahah!

thanks Daddy Hawk - this was fun. and i really appreciate your nominating me. (although jambaloney feels a little slighted - bahahahahah!)

i hope that i haven't bored anyone too much - and if anyone wants clarification on anything - just yell in the comment!