You know those horrible chain emails you get? The ones that say something like, “You’re the reason I smile! I love you! You’re special! Hope I made your day! Send this to 800 of your closest friends before the sun goes down, and you’ll never have to wear deodorant ever again–I swear it’s true; it happened to a cousin of a friend of mine’s girlfriend. Don’t break the chain. Because if you do…you will contract poison ivy of the heart and get very, very sick and probably go into total organ failure and bleed from your eyes just like the beginning of Brian K. Vaughn’s “Y: The Last Man” and then you’ll spend the rest of your miserable life in an iron lung/dialysis machine that also plays a synthesizer version of “The Wind Beneath My Wings”–don’t let this happen to you!!!!”

Yeah, well, I hate those suckers. I delete them, usually while saying, “Die, pig, die!” Then I live in slight fear until the sun goes down.

But just recently, my YA writer compatriot from Canada, Arthur Slade, (yes, Arthur, you) at www.arthurslade.com sent me a meme, which, I gather, is a sort of chain blog thingie with no threats made to your internal organs and no promises of wealth and/or a permanent lack of body odor. ‘Cause he’s a class act. So I’m going to do it. Sort of.

Here are the rules as passed on to me by Mr. Slade:

The rules are that “each player lists 8 facts/habits about themselves. The rules of the game are posted at the beginning before those facts/habits are listed. At the end of the post, the player then tags 8 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog.”

Now, I’m a big one for breaking rules. And for being lazy. Especially when I am on deadline. So I’m going to do the meme, but I’m not passing it on. And if I end up in an iron lung, blinking out the words, “Did you ever know that you’re my hero?” with my one good eye, you’ll know what happened to me.

Here goes:

1. The first concert I ever went to was Paul McCartney and Wings in the sixth grade. I forged Sir Paul’s signature in a little slam book I had and told everybody I got his autograph. I started securing my suite in hell early.
2. I bite my nails; my hands always look like I’ve gone a few rounds in a bar fight.
3. I will read/watch anything that has to do with zombies. But clowns creep me out. So I guess if there were a zombie-clown movie, I’d have a tough call on my hands.
4. My favorite movie is “Blade Runner.” I could watch it again and again. I especially love Roy Batty’s (Rutger Hauer) death speech. I wish I could write a book the way Ridley Scott directs.
5. For a short person, I walk very fast.
6. My shoe size is seven. Please feel free to make donations of cute shoes at any time.
7. The last thing I read was the graphic novel, Fables. (#1)
8. I’m a mom. (I was stumped on the last one and my son, who is sitting next to me, suggested that. I suppose this might be my favorite fact/habit.)

Allrighty. That does it. Feel free to post your own memes.