I’ve seen this on several friend’s pages (most recently Andrew Timson‘s), and so I now take a whack at it.
A book you own that no one on your friends list does: The Forgotten Monarchy of Scotland, by Prince Michael Stewart of Albany. I’m not sure why I own this. It’s not a very good book, the history it relates is total bollocks, and did I mention it’s not very good? The book’s thesis is that Bonnie Prince Charlie had a secret marriage that produced a male heir for the Jacobite cause and that Prince Michael, the author, is the true heir to the British throne. Erm, right.
A CD you own that no one on your friends list does: I could pick any of the Beatles bootleg albums in my collection, but instead I’ll pick Carbon Leaf‘s From Godwin to Scotland. It’s a live album, recorded when they performed at Mills Godwin High School in Richmond, Virginia, for a fundraiser to send the school’s dramatic club on a trip to Scotland.
A DVD/VHS tape you own that no one on your friends list does: A toughie. I’ll pick Dennis Przywara’s Starwoids, a documentary about people who stood in line for upwards of forty-five days to see Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.
A place you’ve been that no one on your friends list has been: It’s not particularly famous, so I’ll say my old home town–Philippi, West Virginia. There’s no reason I can think of that anyone I know–except for family–would have gone there. 🙂
Another meme going around is the “favorite poem” meme. Am I a poetry person? Not really. The closest I have to a favorite poem would probably be Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky.”
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!”He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought–
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!One two! One two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
He chortled in his joy.‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
For a cool website with “Jabberwocky” translations and parodies, take a look at Jabberwocky Variations.