8 fun facts

I'm a bit late because I've been trying to think of interesting things I haven't already shared with you all at one time or another.

1.  I have a fear of doors slamming, especially in quiet places.  This results in me hovering outside offices, while I gently pull the door closed.  Sometimes, I'll pull too hard, or won't realise that I'm standing too close and it'll close abruptly and in my ears, with an earth-shattering crash.  Then I'll jump and apologise to the door and run away.

2.  I was in hospital for a few weeks when I was nearly three although I'm still not entirely sure what was wrong with me.  Apparently it was quiet serious, but I mainly remember the good parts - my own set of Fuzzy Felt, the x-rays and the toilet cistern landing on my mum's head while she was on the loo.  When I came out I was very frail and skinny and I remember having been somewhere with my dad on a Saturday and whining that I was tired and wanted to be carried on the way home.  He wouldn't pick me up because it was still Sabbath and you can't carry then (yes, I know, it makes no sense to me either) but because I was whiny his friends all laughed and said 'oh, just carry her' and he carried me the last few yards home.  One of these friends came to see us in Israel, after mum's funeral and he took one look me and told me the same story - I probably hadn't seen him since it happened, but he remembered me, and it.

3.  My ex-boyfriend once hit me on the back of the head and I saw stars.  I didn't think that really happened in real life, only in Tintin books and cartoons.

4.  Apparently, I have scoliosis, but still find this hard to believe because surely someone would have noticed before now?  Isn't it the sort of thing you know about from childhood? 

5.  One of the holes in my ears was pierced three times: the first time by a boy who took out his own earring and stuck it straight in my ear.  Unsurprisingly, it went septic and I had to go to hospital for a telling off and antibiotics.  The second time was when a friend brought her mum's piercing gun to the pub and I thought it would be a good idea to let her at me in the toilets.  She barely got it in the lobe and it's lucky it didn't go into my neck.  I eventually admitted defeat and went to get it redone at a shop.

6.  One of my favourite memories of my mum is sitting on her knee on the black, vinyl sofa in our house in Leeds and singing along to 'Save all your kisses for me'.  I still unashamedly love that song.

7.  My ideal job would be sit quietly somewhere, in a room full of books, doing quiet research (with special, non-slamming doors).  I'm jealous of my dad, who, for a while in his career, was just paid to think.

8.  8, I forget what 8 was for... oh yes, the nails on the middle fingers of my hands don't match, because I used to suck the fingers on my right hand and damaged the nail beds.  That sounds less grim than it was - I'd gnawed through to the bone, wore down my baby teeth and had open sores on my fingers which I still put in my mouth.  Eventually, the only way they could stop me doing it was to let me wear nail polish if I stopped and I stopped right away.  I was 5.  But a very glamorous 5.