Random Facts or Habits

Missy, over at Missy's Big Fish Stories, has just tagged me for this meme. It's an unusual sort of a thing, where you have to abide by these rules:

1. I have to post these rules before I give you the facts.
2. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
5. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

So here goes, I guess:

1. I am half Australian. My mother was a painter and sculptor who came to the Old Country just before World War II, and, after many adventures, married an RAF Squadron Leader. Result: me.
2. I have had a very chequered career one way or another: I've been an art student, a musician, a bookseller, a full-time writer and part-time small-press publisher, a dairy herdsman, and a computer person. If I've missed any bits out, then they're odd bits of holiday work, or things I did when short of money...
3. I have a thing about women's eyes. And voices. Some people reckon they're always taken with legs, or various other bits - for me it's eyes. Or voices. And eyes...
   
4. Jan has both attributes to an unsettling degree. It was nearly three years from the time we first met till we were married, and for most of that time we didn't see each other, but I just couldn't get her out of my head from the first day she walked into a Creative Writing class I was teaching at Leicester University. Still can't.
5. I have another thing, about Fender guitars. I've played all kinds over the years, but always come back to them. The Telecaster, the Stratocaster and the Jazz Bass are three of the most perfect musical instruments to come out of the 20th century. Nothing can replace them.
6. I was first introduced to the Jesus Prayer in 1978, at a very broken and painful time in my life, by a wonderful monk at Willen Priory, Fr Francis Horner SSM; everything that has happened since has somehow involved that prayer. However far I've wandered, however dark things have at times become, the Prayer has followed me, and brought me home.
7. I first encountered the Anglican Franciscans in 1984, at the Jarrow 1300 celebrations. At the time I knew next to nothing of the order, but there was something about these guys that tugged at my heart in a way I couldn't understand. It took me the best part of twenty years to find out. Slow, some would call me. I wouldn't argue...
8. I wish I could sing. I know the notes I should be singing - I could play them - and I can (sort of) sing along with others. But hold a tune? Easier for me to hold a hyperactive eel.

Now I just have to think of 8 people to tag. H'mm. Let's see...

Lutheran Chik because I always look out for her posts first every morning on my feed reader.

Kelly because she and I play comment tennis every so often, and she's a woman after my own heart in so many ways.

Bigbulkyanglican because he understands guitars.

Kathryn because, I suppose, she manages to be both guileless and profound, often at the same time...

Padre Mickey - the best hagiographer in all the blogosphere. And he plays bass.

Charles of New Haven because anyone whose image of God is "dark, quiet, peaceful, and cavernous" must have at least 8 very remarkable things about them.

Carl McColman because with a journey like his he must have far more than eight...

Claire Joy because, as well as having so appropriate a name in religion, she just has such a big heart that I'd love to know what her eight things might turn out to be!

Remember - like Missy said, it's entirely optional!