This morning, I sat down to write the 25 Random Things About Me thingy that’s been rollicking around the Facebook world.  I wasn’t expecting to post it, or even finish it, but since I did finish, I figured I’d let you see.  It’s mostly boring, and not all that much about food; it’s 25 random things about me.

1.  I have a poster I made in preschool that says I love ladybugs.

2.  I hate ladybugs.

3.  I’m a dreadful liar, except for, I guess, when I was in preschool.

4.  I had an octopus salad with oven-roasted tomatoes and lemon at Saul in Brooklyn the other day and it was once of the best things I’ve ever eaten.

5.  Other than the smoked-beet and halibut dish that I had at Saul a year ago.

6.  I like magic realism.

7.  I can’t do math.  At all.  I took elementary math in college and realized that I had been multipling in a very strange way since grade school.

8.  I was a different person before meeting Jim.  I didn’t read the New York Review of Books.  Or go to fancy restaurants.  I drank at punk-rock bars, worked at a bookstore, and thought of myself as “Indie.”

9.  I never think I’m good enough.  And I’ve learned that it’s actually a good thing.  Motivating even, if a little scary.

10. I met my first boyfriend on vacation in Florida.  I had a black bathing suit that made me look gorgeous (for an 11 year old).  My dad did not like my super-cool 14-year old Florida boyfriend, Nate.  Nate wrote me a letter saying “I’m sorry your dad doesn’t like me.  I wish he would.  Because I love you so much Robbin.” He spelled my name wrong. He was preoccupied with the bathing suit.  On the day we left for home, he gave me a peck on the lips (!) before riding off on his bicycle.  I sat down dreamily on the grass and played Boyz 2 Men loudly on my walkman, planning out my future of going to college in Florida, meeting him by chance on campus, reigniting our love, and getting married on the beach.  My mom and I still refer to it as “the summer of the black bathing suit.”

11. I can roast a mean piece of meat.

12. Jim and I fell in love in a little beach shack behind his grandmother’s house in Amagensett, New York.  The house has since been sold.  Everytime I drive by it now, I’d like to sneak back to the shack and smile at it.

13. We fell in love all over again in a cabana on the beach in Hatteras Village.

14. We’re believers that bodies of water make falling in love easy.

15. We live on the Delaware River.

16. And fall in love every time we swim in it.

17. I often grocery shop by making stops at the local butcher, the small farms, the farm markets, and the apple orchard.  In the summer I go down the street to put money in a jar and pick vegetables from the baskets in my neighbor’s shed.

18. I haven’t had a supermarket egg in over a year.

19. The difference between a heirloom carrot and a Cal-Organic carrot is astonishing.

20. Jim is obsessed with language and these blogs.  I never thought I would have a boyfriend who ignored me when there was a good linguist discussion on the internet, rather than a game on the television.  Though he’ll often be just as absorbed in basketball.  He says it’s silly that I chose my favorite basketball players by how nice they seem, or if they dance during their intro at the All-Star Basketball game.  I like Dwight Howard.  He did that Superman thing at the All-Star Basketball game last year. He seems nice.  And has really big shoulders.  So big really, they’re pretty funny to look at, so he’s my favorite.  I hate the players that wear those goggles because then I can’t see their eyes and judge their emotions on the floor.  And that’s the point of basketball, right?

21. I often wish I lived in the Bay Area, so that I could be in the in-crowd of food bloggers. (I assume they’d take me in.)

22. Though I’m content to share meals with them when they visit.

23. I turn 25 this year.

24. And I’m a little scared.

25. Even though I know that’s silly.