My recent trip to China started me thinking about all of the crazy and maybe unusual things that I've done in my life, so I decided to make a list of the things that keep popping into my head.  Maybe some of the things aren't that unusual, but it just seems to me that the list as a whole is a bit whacky -

I promise that I'll write about the trip as soon as my mind can make sense of it - but right now, I just needed to get this crazy list out of my head....

1. Been to China

2. Used an outhouse for its intended purpose

3. Slept in the same bed that Bill Clinton and Michael Jackson slept in (not at the same time!)

4. Piloted a paddle-wheeler on the Lake of the Ozarks when I was 17 years old

5. Intimidated a 6'6" St. Louis Gang-banger and made him back down and shut-up

6. Driven a tractor

7. Ridden in an eighteen-wheeler

8. Watched the Epcot fireworks from a private yacht on Lake Epcot

9. Designed and built a house

10. Been within 20 yards of a full-grown moose in the Rocky Mt. National Park

11. Driven on a road with snow piled up on both sides higher than the top of an SUV

12. Watched the sun rise over the Atlantic Ocean

13. Watched the sun set over the Pacific Ocean

14. Made pillows out of a feather bed

15. Helped wash clothes in a wringer washer

16. Picked ripe peaches from the tree

17. Spent 8 hours decorating 2 birthday cakes for my grandmother's 75th birthday party

18. Judged a little kid's beauty pageant

19. Married a man I met on the internet

20. Lived in a one-bedroom apartment, a mobile home, a barn and a house with a swimming pool

21. Been flashed

22. Survived cancer

23. Seen Carlsbad Caverns

24. Been to the top of the Washington Monument

25. Collected unemployment compensation

26. Made homemade apple butter

27. Swam in a river

28. Correctly guessed the number of pennies in a quart jar

29. Lost an election that I really wanted to win

30. Lost an election and was sort of happy about losing