everyone else is doing it

[lauralh]

ten things I've done and you haven't:

• can spell and pronounce my hometown of Meaux
• gave away all but a carload of my belongings
• was delivered by a midwife duckierose
• said "Politics is the opiate of the masses"
• told off my ex a year after high school graduation, at the next Graduation
• got pissed off about my younger brother not being a girl
• drove to Atlanta to see U2, Better than Ezra, Pet Shop Boys
• ate dulce de leche ice cream during a winter rain in Buenos Aires
• went to almost every free film in school without actually being in the film society
• threw coins at a shrine during NYE in Tokyo and got pushed along the wave of people massed
• rode a bus from Split, Croatia to Munich, Germany with a little girl puking behind me the whole way and almost managed to get sick myself

Comments

Serendipity:

[perich.livejournal.com]

By some ironic coincidnce, my friends list put this post of yours right on top of this one by tdj.

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

what's the irony?

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

this you mean? (http://www.scalzi.com/whatever/003422.html)

[perich.livejournal.com]

No, I meant this:

It's a generation of defensive egalitarians -- it's not "we're all equal," it's "none of you is better than me." And that's no way to run a railroad.

So it strikes me as apt that LiveJournal would circulate a meme of "ten things I've done that you haven't." In other words, Gen Xers (like you and I) wrack our brains to find what makes us exclusive, not to find what we have in common.

The connection sounds more tenuous now that I have to write it down, but trust me - it made perfect sense when I read it.

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I don't think you qualify as Gen-X.

[perich.livejournal.com]

Well, if I don't then you don't, unless you're secretly much older than I've been led to believe.

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

I dunno, I've heard the cutoff to be anywhere from 1974-1979

[perich.livejournal.com]

Fine. Then you're what's wrong with America. I try and dance around it, but you force me to say it.

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

aw mang

[abrasive-mantra.livejournal.com]

i like your "memes" (i use that loosely because, what are memes?) and i will probably steal them once i find the patience to sit at my computer for longer than fifteen minutes again.

[duckierose.livejournal.com]

was delivered by a midwife


Me, too.

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

but were you then bathed in a hippie bath of herbs and oils?

[duckierose.livejournal.com]

I don't remember.

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

I'll change it!

[fritz-da-kat.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised you've heard of the Pet Shop Boys. They're so MTV Europe!

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

HEARD OF THEM???
dude! you should see my collection.

[fritz-da-kat.livejournal.com]

I should have known you're special!

[duckierose.livejournal.com]

wait, there are people who haven't heard of them?

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

Yes

[duckierose.livejournal.com]

I mean, of course there are, like cavemen and stuff, but I thought they were common knowledge.

First I learn "scroad" isn't a national phrase, and now this. What next?

[herbaliser.livejournal.com]

i've never heard the term "scroad"

[duckierose.livejournal.com]

I know. Most people who didn't grow up in my area don't. Except some strange girl from Vermont I met. But Vermont is essentially NorCal, with more money, so I guess it makes sense.