an eclectic list of one hundred things to know about me.
(last updated on may eight, two-thousand and six)

1. i was named after a fifties actress, carol lynley, but my name is spelled differently.

2. i have one brother.

3. my best friend and i were both born in quezon city, philippines, but found one another in ms. valenciano's fifth grade class in jersey city, new jersey.

4. little kids freak me out, but my nephew brings out the best in me.

5. i am painfully shy.

6. i am the exact opposite only when in the company of my closest friends.

7. i have been hit by a car twice, once in the third grade, and then again in the sixth.

8. i have been in two car accidents. i was driving and was hit the first time and was parked and then hit by a yellow school bus the second time.

9. i can drive stick.

10. i once missed an exam because i overslept.

11. i was a political science major at rutgers college by default.

12. i am a smoker, much to the chagrin of the surgeon general. actually, as of january 27, 2006 i am 3.5 months smoke free and counting.

13. regretfully, i succumbed to a tattoo of some chinese symbol on my left shoulder when i was eighteen. i occasionally forget which shoulder it resides on.

14. paella is my favorite dish.

15. amelie is my all time most favorite movie. i have a crush on audrey tautou.

16. i am extremely empathic.

17. i am a horrible public speaker. in order to overcome this phobia, i must have extremely organized thoughts to reference on 4x6 index cards. these also extend to confrontational situations with friends and family.

18. i played the piano for 7 years of my life and never learned how to read notes.

19. i am an amateur photographer.

20. i put sauerkraut, ketchup and mustard on my hotdogs.

21. i played 1st doubles for my varsity tennis team in highschool. i excelled at the net. i did not excel at serving.

22. the most i have ever drank in one sitting was seven shots of tequila and two bottles of beer. i did not throw up that night. i did, however, get lost on the streets of new york.

23. my dream job would be a corporate position at barnes and noble. discounts, galore!

24. i currently work as an editor at a legal publishing company.

25. my first car's name was lennie/chupa. my jetta is named phoebe. updated as of 5/06: my new car is a black mini cooper named lilo. she's fancy.

26. i love antarctica documentaries.

27. i regift.

28. my brother once tied my hair to a pole while i was crying.

29. i love eating outside. i love outside garden eateries, patio restaurants, etc.

30. i love photo booth pictures.

31. i love bags. my favorite bag is my brown leather messenger bag, lola. yes, i named my bag.

32. my favorite fast food is checkers champ burger, no onions.

33. my second favorite is taco bell's carne asada steak tacos.

34. i once had seven roommates in one apartment. me, michelle, jenn, allan, alex, james, james, and mike. that was a bankable reality show waiting to happen.

35. our landlord was the devil incarnate.

36. i cried when gore/lieberman lost.

37. when i was in the fourth grade, i wrote letters to the ambassadors of norway and japan to stop harpooning whales. no one wrote back to me.

38. my tennis coach believed i was american indian for the first whole year that he coached me.

39. i have one perfect eye. if i closed it right now, my right eye could not see past two feet.

40. i have vision restriction on my driver's license. i do not drive with glasses, though. i laugh in the face of danger.

41. i become ultra-competitive when it comes to the card game speed/spit. i have no qualms about making your 5 year old sister cry.

42. i always mix up amino acids with animo acids. a sort of spoonerism.

43. my favorite childhood bear, clarence the clown, was stolen when our apartment was burglarized when i was in the 3rd grade. that was how the police deduced that it was a woman burglar. i found another version of clarence the clown on ebay in november 2005. i bought him.

44. i am fascinated with all things petite. travel sized bottles, toothpastes, scissors, etc.

45. i once shook 'the rock's' hand.

46. profession i most wish to have: international d.j. superstar.

47. i have a slight dent the middle of my lower lip.

48. i have one chicken pox mark in the middle of my forehead from my childhood. james has the same chicken pox mark in the middle of his forehead.

50. my lips get extremely chapped in any season of the year.

51. i hate black sneakers.

52. i am addicted to shopping.

53. i believe that you can always find one good thing in every store.

54. i love flea market shopping.

55. i believe that karma will always come back to bite you in the ass. nothing in life is free. dont take advantage of it.

56. the television is my night light.

57. expensive jeans are my guilty pleasure.

58. i am training to run a half marathon.

59. i can be very stubborn...even when i know i'm wrong.

60. i hate obnoxious people.

61. i love the harry potter series. the movies were slightly disappointing. book #3, prisoners of azkaban, is my favorite.

62. my nose bleeds are frequent and substantial. the longest nosebleed lasted two hours. i was sent home from school.

63. in the third grade, a rubber band was snapped into my eye. my eye started bleeding and i was sent home from school.

64. i once left a job where i worked for one year without giving any notice. i just took my vacation and never came back. i hated it that much.

65. i once dumped a boyfriend who i went out with for a year without giving him any notice. starting to see a trend here?

66. i hate confrontation.

67. i've only met one person who has the same name as me. and i didnt really meet her. her best friend said that she had a best friend with the same name as me.

68. i'm convinced that i was once abducted by aliens. i went to the bathroom at three-thirty a.m. to pee and when i went back into my room (which was less than a minute later) the clock said six a.m. and the channel four news said five-thirty and when i realized the discrepancy, i looked over at the clock to make sure it was six, and when i looked back at the television, i saw it switch from five-thirty to six o'clock. NO LIE.

69. i hate surprises.

70. i hate magazine subscription inserts.

71. i love pickles. when they still had roy rogers, i used to buy medium sized fries, dump the fries out and then go to the salad bar and refill the whole container with pickles. when my best friend was still working at burger king, she used to hook me up with a medium sized cup of pickles.

72. i make a mean greek salad.

73. balthazar getty was my first real celebrity crush.

74. i can't stand having long nails.

75. the color in my right eye is leaking out into the periphery.

76. i tan very easily. i hardly ever get sunburned.

77. my order at starbucks: tall skim white chocolate mocha, no whip. my starbucks alias: kate.

78. i have a little red birthmark on my stomach.

79. my favorite outfit is jeans and a white tee-shirt.

80. i have a hard time expressing my feelings verbally.

81. i love lilo from lilo & stitch.

82. things i would do if i won the lottery: give my parents and my brother lots of money.

83. things i would do if i won the lottery: i would employ myself to travel around the world and publish my travel photography book.

84. things i would do if i won the lottery: buy a vespa scooter.

85. things i would do if i won the lottery: buy a mini cooper for every day of the work week: black on black; pepper white w/black top; silver w/black top; mint green (custom); grey w/black top

86. things i would do if i won the lottery: take all my closest friends and family on a trip to hawaii, all expenses paid.

87. i have five cameras in all: a cheapey little kodak cameo that i tote around everywhere, a nikon aps camera for trips and such, my lomo for fun different pics, my canon rebel 2000 slr for more serious stuff and my new baby, my canon powershot G2. <updated as of jan '06> lomo for fun, casio ex-z750 for everyday picture-taking, my canon powershot g2 for more serious stuff & travel photography, my canon rebel 2000 slr for my film fetish and the newest addition to the bunch, the canon eos digital xt for super serious stuff.

88. i am currently addicted to hot sauce.

89. my car, phoebe, and my driving are both magnetically drawn to potholes, dips, humps and raised manholes. i'm trying to avoid this phenomenon with lilo.

90. lately i've been prone to stomach problems that are likely to originate from my love of hot sauce.

91. i have had dozens of journals but have never finished one...ever.

92. amanda b. from 'what i like about you' is my favorite teenage actress. mary-kate and ashley come in a close second.

93. i'm not too fond of the lindseys and the hilarys.

94. my 5 freebies: colin farrell; jude law; jason mraz; matthew goodman; orlando bloom.

95. i *heart* marshall's department store.

96. i'm godmother to four children: brianna, ethan, alexa & juliyah (chronological order).

97. i've been a bridesmaid twice (mark & darr's wedding; lynn & todd's wedding).

98. apparently there is a comic strip out there that resembles me because i bought a painting of that comic strip because michelle and i saw the resemblance. i'm too shy to hang it up in my room, so it leans against the wall in the corner of my room behind my dresser.

99. i've visited maine, vermont, massachusetts, new york, connecticut, rhode island, pennsylvania, maryland, virginia, north carolina, georgia, florida, tennessee, illinois, wyoming, colorado, nevada and california.

100. i has taken me one whole year to complete this list of 100 things about myself.