First one off the top of my head is Ultravox - loved them as a kid. First heard them during Live Aid in the 80s. Took them with me to England and Scotland when I was 19, so I could hear their music in their native land, and it did sound different there. I couldn't hear Midge Ure's Scottish accent until I was surrounded by them. Still listen to them occasionally today.
Worst Musical Group?
Worst I ever heard was the Black-Eyed Peas...sorry to any fans. I did like (sorta like) one song, but that died off quickly when I tried to listen to others.
Favorite Musical Instrument?
Out of all of them? Bagpipes or uilleann pipes. Especially if they breathe fire. :-)
Or maybe the ukelele, if I'm in a mellow mood.
Least favorite musical instrument?
My least favorite instrument isn't an instrument, so much as a technique...the slide guitar. Nothing makes my skin crawl faster than a country music song with a slide guitar in it. Although, for some reason, I like blues with a slide guitar. Give me Bonnie Raitt or BB King any day!
Favorite Painting?
Rembrandt's self-portraits. For some reason, they're totally fascinating, and I can't really explain why. Just a feeling.
I also love my daughter's drawings - she did a watercolor painting with me at a church activity once, and blew everyone out of the water, it was so good!
Least favorite painting?
Jackson Pollock's paintings don't do much for me. They just look like someone spilled paint on a canvas and tricked someone into buying them for a lot of money. Great marketer, I guess, but not the best painter.
Favorite Poem?
"On His Blindness", by John Milton. Had to memorize it for an academically-talented class assignment in seventh grade, and I can still recite it by heart today, decades later.
Least favorite poem?
Anything by Charles Bukowski. That guy just rubs me the wrong way.
Favorite Poet?
My great-grandfather Clinton Stockwell (pictured here with his wife and first son). He wrote poetry on little scraps of paper, on the back of mayonnaise spread lids, on the back of old calendars ripped off, Depression-style, and he saved them all. I've got a lot of them in my family records, that I'm hoping to compile into a book of family poetry someday.
Sometimes they were funny poems for his kids, or reflective little poems about things that struck him as funny, or a little contemplation on nature or God. My favorite one is one about him being in bed at night, listening to the mice running under his bed.
His voice is similar to my own, and also sometimes a little bit like Robert Frost's voice, whom I also really, really like.
Least favorite poet?
Again, Charles Bukowski. Bleah!
Favorite Restaurant?
I've eaten in a lot of good places, but I'm not really picky about food. I just love it when someone other than me is doing the cooking.
My current favorite is probably the little Greek Mom-and-Pop restaurant here in my hometown. It's called Yia Yia's House of Gyros, and it's great.
The menu is good, and the staff is friendly. They're not stingy with the hummus. There's fake grapes and grape leaves hanging from the ceiling. The owner has pictures of his yia yia (grandmother) on the walls. Plus, there's sayings on the walls that come straight outta 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding' and super-greasy Greek soap operas on the TV. And that's not even including the complimentary little Greek donuts holes soaked in honey they bring you at the end of the meal.
My husband even forgave the roach he saw that he had to discreetly kill that one time. That really tells you something about the quality of the food, when my husband will go back after seeing a roach. Lesser restaurants have been banned for such things.
Least favorite restaurant?
I'm not fond of chain restaurants in general - fast food restaurants in particular. McDonald's is just Barbie food to me.
We go to fast food restaurants so infrequently that my kids go in, and they have to figure out how to order anything. And then they eat the food and immediately regret it afterward. My youngest son in particular will come up to me - Bleah! Mom, I don't think that was actually food!
Personally, I call that a mom win myself.
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