Six things

I was tagged by Miss Janey a couple of days ago, and I've been wracking my brain since then to come up with six moderately interesting random facts about myself - oh the pressure! Anyway, there's a list of rules to be followed here:
1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Write six random things about yourself. (See below)
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them. (See further below...)
5. Let each person know they've been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

And in no particular order, six random things about me:

1) Someone died in my house, but that doesn't particularly weird me out. I live in a 1917 worker's cottage in a 'village' built around a former cotton mill. Several years ago, I participated in a home tour for the village, so that descendants of the former mill workers could see what all us new folks had done with the houses. I learned that people just love to tell you about their relative dying - in your house! Honestly, I'd already lived here for several years at that point, and nothing particularly supernatural had happened, so...no big deal.

2) My maternal grandfather came from a town called Hanging Limb in Tennessee. Swear to God. My parents, my sister, and I were all born in Michigan, but my mom's side of the family is originally from the South. Hanging Limb specifically, in my grandfather's case.

3) My Swedish Art Deco sofa is named Ingrid, after Ingrid Bergman. I know, it's weird. What can I say?


4) Ream-o-Rama and I were housemates in the early 90's when we both lived in Charleston, SC, and Smithy is actually her cousin. We lived in a funky (affordable) duplex near the Citadel, and threw at least one big party. (My memory is a little hazy now.) There was one especially outraged British neighbor who knocked on the door during the party, and trilled in horror that there was a man uuuuurinating in our front yard. Oh dear, way to class up the neighborhood. Oh, this came later, but ask her about the Devil Cow, I dare you.

5) The picture in my profile of me with the chimp was taken by my talented friend, Louis Cahill. A couple years ago, I got to tag along with him and his wife Kathy to visit behind the scenes at a smallish traveling circus, while Louis did a photo shoot with some of the animal keepers and their animals. He took my picture with Ricky, a 3 or 4 year old juvenile chimp. Later on in the photo shoot, some other folks and I were bystanders when a pair of Ricky's mature chimp family members attacked my friend Louis. 'Attacked by chimps' might sound kinda funny haha until you see it happen. Those were some cunning, powerfully strong, opportunistic bitches. They literally bided their time, and waited for the right opportunity to charge after him. He got banged up, and literally lost his shirt, but was very lucky not have been more injured. Even the camera survived.

6) On that same circus visit, I got to feed an elephant, and later on ride one. It was scary and completely amazing at the same time. And it was probably one of the most unusual things I've done in an otherwise pretty ordinary life. Ever since then, I've been fascinated by elephants.

Now, I'm a little stumped by who to tag next. An awful lot of the blogs I follow have zillions of comments, and aren't likely to see my little tag. Or in the case of Miss Janey and MrPenee, they've already played the game. But we'll give it a whirl and see what happens. I'll cheat a bit and tag back Reamorama, Monkeyshines, Reclaiming Miss Havisham, Architect Design, Maison 21, and Kwana Writes.