Monday Mimisms: The Queen Doth Answer Rightly

Bloggingham Palace was quiet this weekend. No uprisings to report. Not a single servant flogged. Nothing of royal importance. So I granted Linda - winner and keeper of the sacred M&Ms the answers to her 5 Question Interview Meme. She was tagged by Jamie (Duward Discussion) and Gale Martin (Gem-osophy) who was tagged by Heaven only knows. This is what Linda would like to know about moi. I have answered truthfully. Sometimes my fingers were crossed.

It is Linda's lucky day once again. She thusly tagged me twice. I shall thusly answer twice. I have no idea why I'm saying thusly except that it sounds very queenly. And besides, it might just irritate the pumpernickel out of some lonely unfulfilled English teacher out there who needs to revitalize her red pen....er....you know what I mean.

1. When were you first crowned the Queen of Memes and exactly how did that event come to be? Was it a self-proclamation or were you appointed by the masses?

I was crowned by a man who wore underwear on his head.
Let me explain.

Once upon a time.....way back when, before Bloglogs, peace globes, Sitemeters and Flickr photos, there were no masses. I knew two bloggers; Author Gale Martin from Pennsylvania and Lizza from the Philippines. Nobody's blog was fancy. We hardly knew how to comment. And then somebody started a five question Book Meme. It went back so far I think it came over on the Ark. I tried to make a genealogy tree for it but ran out of trees. My little blogworld was expanding, however.

In September, 2006 a blogger from London named Yaxlich was tossed the meme by lovely little Lizza. The book memes were really fabulous; insightful, intellectual and infectious. I was so impressed with them I decided to start a blog to house them all in one place. Mind you, this was PPG (pre-peace-globe) and I had more time on my hands.

Hence the birth of Book Meme Central and then Movie Meme Central and then Halloween Meme Central and Carnival Central and on and on.......Yaxlich - who at the time was totally obsessed with his underwear in some PantAid thing I don't even want to discuss and also known for his effusive third-person speech- called me "Mimi - Queen of Memes" in a comment. Read here for further proof. The title stuck and spread thru the Blogosphere like ....well....like a meme!

Thus, I became Mimi Queen of Memes.
Here I am hobnobbing with Queen Elizabeth just hours before she abdicated in deference to moi. See?

2. How on earth do you manage to keep up with so many different blogs and still find time to have a real life outside of your computer?

I have put the meme blogs on hold for awhile (as you can see) but plan to catch up later. I do have a real life on the outside but my blogs do demand a lot of attention and time. Too much, I must admit. Since my primary reason to start blogging was to write and get published, I have to really be careful about letting blog duties usurp that priority. I just had this discussion with a certain someone a few days ago. I don't have trouble prioritizing my list of chores, I have trouble sticking to the list. I feel pulled in a million directions at times. I have a full-time stressful career and other daily obligations. Regular workouts/exercise is a biggie with me and is the one thing I try not to skip - as is my precious alone time that keeps me centered and able to focus and write. If those two activities are part of my day, I find I work smarter and feel better.
Peace Globes is growing into a phenomenal venture that I'm very excited about.

3. On your "Dating Profile of the Day" blog you seem to find the cream of the crop of crap when it comes to dating profiles - how ever do you do it and how do you manage to keep your sanity?

You think I'm sane?!

Linda, I lost my sanity while I was dating online. It only returned when I stopped the nonsense. At first I thought it was a great way to meet people after my divorce. It was.
I met a lot of crazy people.

Men who pretended to be someone else, men who were someone else, men with pictures 20 years old, foreign men who wanted wives, men who pretended to have college degrees and a slew of everything else in between. At first it was maddening. Then it became comical. I did have two very nice dating relationships with "normal" guys along the way but I'm convinced that was a lucky lark. Interestingly enough, both later found the love of their lives on Match.com and married. One then divorced. Again. I rest my case.

Actually, Dating Profile of the Day started accidentally. I was so dismayed with the middle-aged dating scene that I wrote a letter to my girlfriends describing my recent disasters. They thought it was hysterically funny. People suggested I put it in book form. So I continued to write about my experiences. I never thought of myself as a funny writer before that. Blogging entered my life and became the perfect avenue. 

It takes much less time than Mimi Writes. adrift they seem to be. What continued to fuel my writing about them was the absurdity of how well these services mismatch people. I was not amused. But I keep my sanity, as you say, by never losing my sense of humor about it.

And it is not difficult at all to find the typos and sentences you see in my posts. A good pencil skirt never reveals her sources but I will say this: The profile headlines and sentences I find come from many, many parts of the country and world. What amazes me is how similarly
I used to bristle when friends would joke about "those crazy people on dating sites" because after all, I was on a dating site too.
Long enough to realize they were right.

It was a learning experience. To be fair, not all men or women on dating sites are wacko. Some just need Spellcheck. There are people who genuinely want to be in a relationship and I do hope they find one. I also hope people realize that these are not men I've ever met or even spoken with. (A blogger left a comment once who obviously thought I'd dated all these men! ) I don't think she was paying attention. I have now written 203 bachelor posts and counting.......but I'm hoping, Linda, that I somehow will stumble across the perfect man for you. I'm keeping my eyes peeled for a man who will honor the Dispatch Goddess that you are!

4. As a Southern Gal, other than the guy, what is the thing that you have found you like the best about Connecticut? And that includes his family, too, so don't try to wheedle your way out of the answer that way!

No wheedling.
I love the proximity to Boston and surrounding cities. Culturally and educationally speaking, there is much more to experience. I adore the colonial style homes and quaint atmosphere. I haven't experienced a true New England winter blast yet but I did once smell snow - a subject that has been nauseatingly exhausted on this blog. And of course, Connecticut is the highest paying state for folks in my field, which is always a draw. I like that there are no southern drawls to be heard. I've never seen a raggedy pickup truck and people do not spit on the sidewalk.
I do not like the traffic. Or the wind.
But then there's ......so the "not likes" are never glaring. I didn't wheedle. Did I?


5. If you could be anybody at all in the world for just one day, who would that person be and why?
What a question. Hmmmm.....should I answer this seriously or flippantly?
I'll do both. First the hogwash. I would like to reincarnate Scarlett O'Hara and put her on a dating site. Then I'd write about her experiences. Sort of like a pencil skirt "ghost" writer. Ha!

I crack myself up.

But seriously, if I had the authority to say one word that would stop the war in Iraq, I'd like to be the person who has that authority.
My first name might be George.

NOTE: oops, I forgot to "answer thusly twice" - the other meme I will do later.
Thank you, Linda, for these thought-provoking questions. I enjoyed answering and will soon interview a few others myself. I'm up for more questions from anyone who'd like to throw a few my way.

Anytime.
Same pencil skirt.

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