“I’d rather regret the things I’ve done than regret the things I haven’t done.” – Lucille Ball

I’ve made up for this post being so late by making it rather full.

The point of the AN52 blog for me is to push myself to get outside my comfort zone & experience new things. But in all of the searches to find ideas for new things, I keep coming across lists with several things I’ve already accomplished. I thank God for His every blessing for these opportunities & the strength to pursue them. But I’ve never put actual time & effort into documenting the many & varied splendors of the life we’re creating. What better way to do so than to make a list of cool things I’ve done? Here it is—52 numbers/thoughts/experiences of things in my life that I have done which were somewhat important, insightful or at least amusing:

1. Tent on a trampoline & a van—the strangest places I’ve ever had a sleepover.
2. 2—number of languages that I speak.
3. Guinea pig & sea anemone—two of the strangest foods I’ve ever eaten. The guinea pig (or cuy as it was called) tasted like greasy chicken & the sea anemone was like a piece of leather that had been soaked in salt water & vinegar for 1,000 years.
4. Leah—the friend with whom I ran & danced through some random sprinklers by the side of the road one summer night last year.
5. 0—the number of people who usually used the elevator in our dorm. 2—the number of people who decided to use it after I had set up my hammock in it.
6. 24—number of teeth I have after getting (by my memory) four removed before my braces were put on. Since the average human has 32 teeth, I’ve either misremembered or there’s a foul plot atooth….
7. Dirt—the pile of stuff I landed on after jumping off of the 2nd floor of a building.
8. Lobster red—the color of the sunburn I got on only one side of my face.
9. Epic & sore—how I felt after going whitewater rafting & not falling out of the boat.
10. 4—the types of major types of transportation that I have used at one time or another (planes, trains, automobiles & boats).
11. Albino seed of the Indian mother—The insult that I witnessed a deranged lady yelling at one of my friends on a New York City subway at 2 AM.
12. “We have a major in fart?”—the phrase I heard a fellow telecounselor say right before I busted out laughing for like five minutes on someone’s answering machine. I really should have hung up, but I kept thinking I’d stop laughing & be able to see if they were interested in coming to our university. Yes, I was one of those annoying telecounselor callers.
13. Structural—the type of welding that I did on a church building in Ecuador (don’t worry, I took welding as a class in HS, so I pretty much knew what I was doing).
14. 2 1/2—number of scars I have from bites. Two were from dogs & one was from a friend’s 10-year-old brother (it’s an emotional scar, which is why it only counts as 1/2).
15. 23—the age of my single friend Joanna when I threw her a wedding shower-themed birthday.
16. Nose—the only bone I’ve broken, though I’m not really counting it because it didn’t even bleed & I didn’t get a cast for people to sign.
17. 25 feet—distance between me & a humpback whale that I saw while on a whale-watching trip. Also, 5—feet between a black bear & I in a national park after that whale-watching trip.
18. 1968—year of the Plymouth Fury III (vintage car) that I own.
19. Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5—the piece I performed onstage as a classically trained, operatic chicken.
20. Whoa, it’s salty!—my thoughts of ocean water the first time I swam in it in the Pacific in 2010.
21. 45 mph—the speed of the buses traveling along the bridge that I jumped off of (while attached to a harness) in a foreign country.
22. Wench—my costume of choice for the last two Renaissance Festivals that I have dressed up for.
23. 1—number of times I thought I might have been falling in love & consequently learned to properly stalk said object of my affection.
24. Booda—the nickname I received when I was a part of the most awesome student-elected (& staff-appointed) group of collegiate government leaders, also known as ASG (made Senior year one of the BEST)!
25. 4—number of countries I have been in (Ecuador, Australia, Canada & the U.S.<—totally counts as a country).
26. 2—number of majors that I earned at college.
27. Alaska—destination of the cruise that I went on with some friends.
28. 2—number of equator museums I have visited. There was the traditional location of the equator museum & about 900 yards away was the actual location of the equator museum.
29. Basketball—the sport I set a record for in high school. (four fouls in 30 seconds)
30. 3—weddings I have been in (& yet never a flower girl!). I was a bridesmaid, a groomsmaid & a maid of honor (anything for my wonderful friends!).
31. Yearbook deadlines—the reason I stayed awake for 72 hours straight.
32. Third, fifth & sixth—the ribbons I won for hunt seat equitation classes (that’s fancy English horseback riding if you weren’t sure).
33. Truck—object I felt I had been run over by when I had the swine flu.
34. Lady—the name of the horse that I owned for two weeks before she passed away from cancer.
35. Tomatoes—the only plant I’ve successfully gotten to grow in a garden & then they just wouldn’t stop growing. So many tomatoes…
36. Socks—the only thing I’ve ever set on fire in a microwave. I’m a good friend & one of my suitemates had cold feet.
37. The A.D.D. Hour—name of the radio show that I hosted in college.
38. Rocks & sand—the main things I saw when I went snorkeling with my Dad & brother in Lake Michigan while growing up.
39. Daniel & Shawna—friends who taught me how to do back flips & front flips off of the diving board.
40. Rather embarrased—how I felt when a little boy pulled down my pants in front of an entire Chicago bus station.
41. 8—number of years that I took horseback riding lessons. 1—number of times myself & the saddle slid to the ground around the horse I was riding because I had not tightened the girth enough. That’s all it takes.
42. Headache—result of getting super-thick glasses after lying a lot on the eye chart in 3rd grade (because all of the cool kids had glasses). Mom was also upset when I told her I had lied, but she didn’t kill me, so that was cool.
43. 2—number of times that I almost died as a child, once by drowning & once by asphyxiation due to pneumonia.
44. Walmart—where I was asked out on a date by a total stranger (who looked just like Barack Obama, incidentally) while my friend was trying not to bust out laughing.
45. 5—number of times I took the ACT (I also took the PSAT & SAT once each). I love how standardized tests sort of say, “Your brain is this good”.
46. Candace—girl who let me back into the hotel room that I sleptwalked out of when we were at a SADD conference in high school.
47. 3—number of students I knocked over when I tripped down the stairs on my way to get an award in elementary school. That was my moment in the spotlight (literally).
48. eHarmony & Twitter—the two websites where I have profiles set up by other people. My friend set up the eHarmony profile for me (without my knowledge) when she didn’t want to do homework. My coworkers set up the @Robertasaidwhat Twitter feed (also without my knowledge) to tweet things that I have said; when I stumbled upon it, I thought someone had stolen my identity.
49. Black diamond—level (advanced) of ski slope that I made it through on the fourth day I’d ever skied. It took a while, but a 10-year-old girl took me through it.
50. Junior high hallway—first place I learned to do a cart-wheel.
51. Acnestis—the part of the back, usually between the shoulder blades, that people can’t reach. I’m listing it here because due to my freaky monkey arms, I don’t have one.
52. A bajillion—number of blessings God has bestowed upon me in my life—grace, friends, family, love, laughter, food, videos of cats falling off things.

Way to make it all the way to the bottom! What a trooper, here’s a cookie 🙂