Answer me these questions three eight!

Another quiz-thing from Erin, who didn't specifically tag me but rather tossed out an open invitation. It's "Eight Things" of various sorts. I'm also adding a new category, at the very end. Here we go!

8 things I am passionate about:

1. Pizza in all its forms
2. Good writing
3. Science Fiction
4. Fantasy
5. Liberal politics
6. Workwear
7. The proper use of the English language
8. Ice Cream

8 things I want to do before I die

1. Watch the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy (extended editions) back-to-back-to-back.
2. Watch the Buffalo Bills win the Super Bowl. The Buffalo Bills. Not the Toronto Bills, the San Antonio Bills, or any other Bills.
3. Write something that gets read widely.
4. Travel to Great Britain and see various locales related to the Arthurian legends.
5. Go to New Zealand and walk the Milford Track.
6. See the populations of Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and other Upstate New York locales start to go up again.
7. Meet more of my favorite blog-friends in person.
8. Thank George Lucas in person.

8 things I say often

1. "For the LOVE of GOD!"
2. "Yeah, that's a good idea."
3. "Oh, my, my, my my my. What a mess."
4. "Oh noes!"
5. "Yeah. I'll get right on that."
6. "Lester, DOWN!" (often repeated several times, while Lester mulls over whether I'm addressing him or some other cat named Lester.)
7. "So do you have homework tonight?"
8. "Ahhh, f***." (I admit it. This tends to be my first utterance upon hearing the alarm clock in the morning.)

8 books I’ve read recently (Some of these I've blogged about here, but I'm not going to dig through archives for links to posts just now.)

1. The Griffin and Sabine trilogy, Nick Bantock
2. The Morningstar trilogy, also Nick Bantock
3. A Princess of Mars, Edgar Rice Burroughs
4. The Rest is Noise, Alex Ross (still reading it)
5. Fray, Joss Whedon
6. Kingdom Come, Alex Ross (the other Alex Ross)
7. The Nasty Bits, Anthony Bourdain
8. The Bible (Genesis and Exodus thus far. An ongoing project.)

8 songs I could listen to over and over

1."Fernando", Abba (Seriously. I love this song. There was something in the air that night, the stars were bright, Fernando!)
2."On the Street Where You Live", Lerner and Loewe, from Brigadoon My Fair Lady. (How on Earth did I type Brigadoon? Yeesh! But for a Brigadoon song, there's always "There But For You Go I".)
3."I'm All Right", Jo Dee Messina. I'm not a big country fan, but this song just sticks in my head in a big way.
4."People Get Ready", Curtis Mayfield. (I especially love the Rod Stewart-Jeff Beck cover from the 80s.)
5."Into the West", Howard Shore, from The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Sung by Annie Lennox.
6."Smoke Gets In Your Eyes", the Platters.
7."I Dreamed a Dream", from Les Miserables.
8."Scythe Song", Dougie MacLean.

8 things that attract me to my best friends

1. Ability to get my more obscure jokes
2. Their interesting things to say
3. Their reliability
4. Their loyalty
5. Their refusal to pass judgment on things
6. Their steadfastedness
7. Their laughter
8. Their dislike of the New England Stupid Patriots (OK, this isn't necessarily a dealbreaker. But it helps!)

8 (or more) things that I am thankful for this year

1. Books.
2. Music.
3. Movies.
4. The Store.
5. Coconut cream pie.
6. Pizza.
7. Yeungling Lager, chilled almost to the point of freezing.
8. Spiced Rum.
9. Vanilla Rum.
10. Coconut rum.
11. Chocolate.
12. Overalls.
13. Friends, in real life and online.
14. This blog.
15. The readers of this blog.
16. A roof above my head.
17. Paper to write on.
18. Stories in my head to tell.
19. The Wife and Daughter.

By way of a meta-blog note, posting will be light over the weekend. Happy Thanksgiving, and may the Force be with you all!