I’ve Got Your 8 Things Right Here, Pal

So the evil Dave Fleet tags me with the 8 Things meme. Damn Englanadians. Just for that, Dave, I’m coming up there this week to throw snow balls in your general direction.

(Kidding Dave. I’m flattered you chose me. Unfortunately, now you’ll have to read the whole thing.)

I find it rather amusing this meme is still around. I’m fairly certain it was one of the first to splash around MySpace and other blog-friendly social networking sites a few years back. At first it was five things. Then someone got greedy and made it 10. Now, I see, the practical business crowd has come to the realization that five isn’t behind the curtain enough and 10 is TMI.

I’ve done this a couple times back when I had another blog (one of my eight … but you’ll have to wait). The problem is deciding just how personal you want to go. Humanity is revealed by exposing your flaws but who in business wants the world to know you once cursed out your seventh grade math teacher … hypothetically?

Of course, if you don’t offer too much, you’re stayed and boring. But then again, are random blog readers going to see this or are you writing it for those who know you a little better?

So with all that confusion in mind, here are eight things you probably didn’t know about me.

1. I’ve been a blogger since 1998.

My personal blog was a home for essays, narrative non-fiction and fiction stories. Actually, that’s being rather bland. It was a humor website where I tried to be as outlandishly funny and yes, often subversive and obscene. It evolved from a Dave Berry-esque newspaper column I wrote for my hometown newspaper. It died a painful death, complete with a full wake, when I realized my clients might not take to kindly to the stuff I made up.

The website featured funny, man-on-the-street interview videos that were the inspiration for some of my work at The Daily Idea. The best PG-rated exchange came when I was interviewing the owner of The Bucket Truck at an art car show. He took five gallon buckets, melted them down and then sculpted them into items he attached to his van. I asked this rather mountain man-looking gentleman if before he melted them down he used the buckets to carry body parts to the back of his property. He cocked his head to one side, thought for a moment and said, “Oh yeah.”

2. I was a country music deejay.

All my friends had crappy high school jobs. I didn’t want to work at Zippy Mart or the movie theatre. At age 15, I walked into the radio station, said, “I want to be a deejay,” read a news script and worked the night shift the next day. By the time I was 16, I was the morning show jock and used to call Willie Nelson’s record company live on the air to find out where we could send our donations to pay off his taxes.

3. I met my wife in the strangest of ways.

While doing stand-up comedy (okay, maybe that should have been an entry, too) at a summer camp, I asked the crowd if any of the girls had not yet been hit on by a certain guy who was obnoxious about approaching the women there. One raised her hand. My response was, “What do you have, V.D.?!” The next day, I found her to make sure she wasn’t offended. She said I obviously didn’t hear that she responded by saying, “No, do you want some?” We’ve been happily married for years.

4. There’s a chance I once got Ted Kennedy drunk.

While on a tour of Appalachia in 1981, Ted Kennedy stopped at a health department about 30 minutes from my house. My mother and I went and took him a box of gifts. An eight-year-old Jason Falls pushed his way through the press conference crowd to present it. Someone (not my mother) included in the gift box a mason jar of good, ole’ fashioned, Kentucky moonshine.

5. I got paid to watch ballgames for a living.

While I bounced back and forth from broadcasting to sports information (which is what PR is called in college athletics), I essentially had the best seats in the house for professional and college athletic events for a decade. That run included a two year stint as a radio producer for ABC in New York, being a part of two small college national championships and calling play-by-play for an NCAA Baseball Regional. There are very few sports I haven’t written about, kept statistics for or travelled with, except curling, cricket and all those other sports Dave Fleet probably likes.

6. I got a medal for being a hero once.

It’s probably the only truly worthwhile, altruistic thing I’ve ever done, yet I never talk about it because it seems pretentious. I was 10-years-old delivering newspapers in my neighborhood. His house was on fire. I went in and helped him out. It was then, and is now, not nearly as big of a deal as people made it out to be.

7. I’m dumbfounded by the success of Joaquin Phoenix.

This guy makes $10 million a movie and is considered a dreamy sex symbol. He’s got a hair lip. Blows my mind.

8. I drink more Diet Pepsi in one day that most people drink all week.

On an average day, I’ll have a can on the way to work, a 32-ounce fountain drink when I get to work, 2-5 16-ounce glasses at lunch depending upon the wait for food, one or two more 32-ounce fountains in the afternoon and anywhere from 2-5 cans after dinner. My doctor says I should drink more water, but he’s not really concerned. I think I’ll be the first ever diagnosed case of cirrhosis of the kidney.

Another thing I hate about memes is tagging people because I always think I’ll find one that gets pissed at me for doing it. But I’m not one to completely rock the boat on this type of thing, either. So, Jeremy Pepper, Harry Hoover, Nick Huhn, Ike Pigott and Dan Zarrella, you’re it.

Other 8 Things Posts You’ll Find Interesting:

1. Geoff Livingston
2. Susan Getgood
3. Mitch Joel
4. Phil Gomes
5. Maggie Fox

[tags]8 things, meme[/tags]