All about MeMe

Will has inspired me to write something about myself:

The rules: You must list one fact about yourself for each letter of your middle name. Each fact must begin with that letter. If you don’t have a middle name, just use your maiden name. After you’ve been tagged, you need to update your blog with your middle name and answers. At the end of your post, you need to tag one person for each letter of your middle name.

That fits in nicely with today’s earlier acronym post. Unfortunately, there is a small snag: I don’t have a middle name and since Mr TLC and I reside in a state of unwedded bliss, I don’t have a maiden name either – I don’t consider my surname as a maiden name, since I’m not planning on changing it anytime. However, I do have a solution to this slight difficulty.

Here we go: my middle name is LEGGED. (Hey, I am Three Legged Cat!)

L is for Linguist.

This is Mr TLC’s suggestion, I think it’s a bit of an over-statement so maybe I should go for Language Learner. I started learning French again about 5 years ago, something I hadn’t done since taking my ‘O’ levels at school. I don’t know why I ever gave up really – I always promised myself I would return to studying French and German once I finished at university, but it took me 14 years to get around to it.

I love learning languages, I like being able to talk to people in France when I go on holiday and I enjoy being able to read the cycling news in L’Equipe, the French sports newspaper. When you are a cycling fan, the sports pages in the English papers aren’t much use! I also like the fact that learning a language is a challenge and I enjoy finding the links between English and French. In fact learning French has actually improved my English – particularly my grammar, something that I didn’t expect to happen.

E is for Easy Going.

Another of Mr TLC’s suggestions, but he’s probably right. I can get along with most people and I have a fairly relaxed attitude towards life in general. I don’t easily take offence, especially if none was intended and if I do get annoyed (and sometimes I get absolutely enraged), I never stay angry for long. So there you are, I’m easy going, except when I’m grumpy, but we’ll gloss over that. (Does that count as the two Gs?)

G is for Geek.

I spend way too much time online. I have a small, but growing, collection of mechanical calculators. I like admiring great engineering, especially bridges, I love bridges.

I like maths, which clearly places me in a minority. (If you don’t believe me, next time you meet someone at a party, try telling them you’re a maths teacher. They will almost certainly tell you that they could never “do” maths at school, before they make their excuses and shuffle away. Sometimes I pretend to be a toilet attendant instead; people don’t believe me, but it gets a better reaction.)

It’s true, I am a geek and happy to admit it.

G is for Gardener.

I love my garden, how very English of me. I like watching things grow. I love flowers although with a small, north-facing garden, I have learned to create a garden with a lot of coloured foliage and just a few flowers. I get a lift from the vivid winter colours of the bark on the dogwoods. Best of all, I like sitting in the garden in summer watching it, alive with wildlife.

Mr TLC said I should put G is for Gentle. I was surprised by this.
“Am I gentle?”
“You are with the cats.”
Oh dear, that doesn’t say much for me, does it?

E is for Educator.

I am what I do. (Although if I continue in that vein I might have to change to E is for Existenialist.) Being a teacher is really important to me, I am proud of my job. I didn’t set out to be a teacher and I never intended it to be a long term career, but I surprised myself. I like it and most of the time I’m fairly good at it.

I was lucky when I was at school: I had teachers who taught to me to think, to ask questions, to find things out for myself. I learned to discuss ideas with others, to analyse problems, to see other people’s points of view. If I can pass just some of that on to my students then I have done something worthwhile.

D is for Dedicated.

Mr TLC was quite emphatic about this one – I was going to pick disorganised! He is right, I get very passionate about things that I believe in. I also work very hard, particularly at everything school related. Unfortunately I am not always very organised and I’m useless at finishing things (I can always see something extra that should be done), so my commitments to various projects can be a little unsatisfactory, but I have no shortage of enthusiasm or belief. Except on Friday afternoons or Monday mornings, when I’m knackered.

So now, it’s over to you! I’m not going to do any tagging (well six letters would mean six tags – that’s more than my entire readership!), but feel free to join in if you wish.

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