25 Random Things

My friends have been spreading this “25 Random Things About Me” meme across the Internet, so I need to make the list before they bury me in Facebook requests.

1. I went through Hurricane Bob in a tent at the 1985 National Boy Scout Jamboree.
2. My high school (NCSSM) had a video production program. I first learned video editing there and made my first video before I was 17.
3. I once played drums in a pick-up band with Neal Schon (guitar player for Journey) and employees of the Gibson guitar company.
4. As a founding member of Clemson Cable Network (CCN, the university’s cable network), I used the TV station to play an April Fool’s prank on the parking department (announcing they had 500 free concert tickets to give away). Students showed up demanding the parking department give them tickets. The irony was lost on university management.
5. I am a co-author of two US Patents (awarded, not pending).
6. Due to business travel I made ten trips to Asia one year (visiting customers in Korea, China, Japan & Taiwan).
7. I’ve been interviewed by Slashdot (long story about computer journalists who can’t read press releases).
8. When I started making videos, I never wanted to be in front of the camera. Apparently I got over that.
9. Most people think folks can be divided into “tea people” and “coffee people” but I will drink either one (assuming it’s actually good tea/coffee).
10. My first musical instrument was the clarinet. I told my dad I wanted to play saxophone, but the band director convinced him the clarinet  was better for beginners. Turns out the band was short of clarinet players (sucker).
11. I ended up on drums the next year when my clarinet broke and my parents wouldn’t pay to repair it (it was that or fail band). That was over 20 years ago.
12. Despite all of my world travel, I have never been south of the equator.
13. I first started martial arts when I was 10, but quit at 14 to give school sports a try (parents wouldn’t let me do both). I still regret walking away at that age, which is part of the reason I started again at age 29.
14. My mom gave me the best advice about drinking before I want to college – “If you think you’re going to be sick, throw up before you go to bed so you won’t be as hungover in the morning.”  I didn’t drink till I was 20.
15. I’ve only ever broken up with one woman in my life (the rest dumped me first). After that we managed to stay friends then started dating again. The relationship ended the second time after a fight. I don’t know if she will ever talk to me again. I miss her. It still hurts.
16. Despite not being a morning person in college, I spent one semester hosting a morning show in college (Wednesdays, 7-10AM on WSBF-FM). It was not a “wacky” morning show.
17. I learned to laugh at myself as one way to defend myself against the bullies and “popular crowd” at school. Laughing at myself took away their ability to make fun of me, and I’ve kept humor as a weapon ever since.
18. One of my first public speaking events was giving the sermon for a youth-run ceremony at a Methodist church in Goldsboro, NC.
19. I enjoy driving with the windows down, even though the engineer in my head continues to scream about gas mileage every time I do it (too bad, since I can’t hear him over the wind).
20. I have more people I consider close friends at this point in my life than at anytime before.
21. Thanks to my Grandfather’s service in the U.S. Navy, I could have been accepted in the Naval Academy. I would have gone if I still wanted to be a fighter pilot, but I knew my eyesight would have been a problem.
22. I only wanted to be a fighter pilot because most astronauts I read about were pilots. After the Challenger accident, I didn’t want to be an astronaut anymore.
23. This list has become a lot more personal than I thought it would, but I don’t mind.
24. As a teenager, I never really had a plan for where I would be in my 30′s. No matter what I could have thought up, it would not have been as good as what I have now.
25. I’m not tagging anybody with this meme once I’m done. Take that, Internet!