All is Revealed

by Hank

SO? How'd you do? I've looked at all your guesses...and some of you rocked! Others of you--well, let's just say the Tarts are good at keeping secrets. See below for the prize winners! But first, all is revealed!

Here are the questions again--with the answers!

Can you picture the Tarts as Tartlets? As little girls, two of the Tarts wanted to be veterinarians.  Can you guess who?  NANCY and  HARLEY

One planned to be a beautician. Who do you think that is?  KATHY

One, a geneticist. Who? HANK

And still today, one of us thinks if she weren’t a writer—she might sell real estate. SARAH

 As a kid, one of the Tarts played cello, oboe, clarinet and piano. (Not at the same time.) Which Tart is the musical prodigy? HARLEY

Which Tarts are artists? One of us won a contest—okay, in fifth grade but it still counts—for drawing a sketch of her mother. Who?   HARLEY

And one of us is still brilliant at drawing—horses.NANCY

We had wonderful high school and college careers.

One of us married her English professor. ELAINE

One was voted “Most Individual” in her high school.  HANK

One was her high school mascot—costume and all. Who danced for the crowd?KATHY

One was a majorette—baton, white boots and all. Who marched to Tuxedo Junction? HANK (But I was terrible. Middle of the back row)

 Athletics? Sure, we rock.  In our own ways.
One holds her high school’s record for the SHORTEST broad jump. ELAINE

 One’s a weightlifter. At her best, she could bench 250 pounds, which was more than twice her body weight. KATHY

One—qualified for the Olympic swim team.  NANCY!

And one took beginning tennis—a one-semester course—for three years.  HANK

Hobbies?

One Tart collects decorating magazines. NANCY

One has an “absurd fascination” with Mormons. SARAH

One is really good at counted cross stitch. HARLEY

((And that ain’t all. The Tarts have many other talents. Oh, yes indeed. (This is where Me, Margie, kept raising her hand. I ignored her. You don't wanna know. She keeps trying to have me list her talents. Puh-leeze.)

Which of us can do mirror writing? (That’s cursive writing that can be read in a mirror.) HARLEY

Which of us can sing songs using only the first letter of each word?  HANK

Which of us can throw a bullet of a forward pass? (oh, that’s too easy)  NANCY!

SOO? How'd you do?  ANd now--tell us something WE don't know about YOU!

********************************************************

Who wins the prizes?  Here are just some of the winners...KERRY wins Nancy's new book!  JodiL and Storyteller Mary win ARCS of PRIME TIME!  Peach wins a DRIVE TIME canvas tote bag!  But that's not all--watch the comments space--for the rest of the many more winners! (Winners--please contact Hank through her website and she'll arrange to get you your loot!) (I'm flying back to Boston Sunday AM--so see you when I get home!)

Comments

[Karen in Ohio]

Oh, man. I was afraid of being one of the ones Hank was referring to when she said some of us were way off the mark! But I did get the geneticist right!

This was fun.

[storyteller Mary]

Great fun!! Thanks! . . . and who whistles??

[Kathy Sweeney]

I'm the one who can whistle loud enough to silence a crowd.

(I have to use two fingers though - my son is determined to one-up me and learn to do it without...)

[storyteller Mary]

. . . and can we see one of Nancy's horse drawings?? pretty please . . .

[Al_S]

I did better than I thought. This was a lot of fun.

Many years ago, my passport was stolen at Kennedy airport. I didn't realize this until I was on the plane. After a long anxious flight I was hustled to a Swedish customs agent where I was asked for some ID, Birth certificate? No. Voter Registration: No. Finally I produced my library card. They let me into the country!

There are more benefits to being an avid reader than you might suspect.

[storyteller Mary]

"Having fun isn't hard, if you have a library card!"
Couldn't resist. My sophomores once spontaneously joined me in that chant from Arthur. I think we were discussing DVDs at the library for free at the time . . . picking up on things late (not unusual), one young lady asked, "Is it cheaper than Block Buster?"

[storyteller Mary]

Yeah, Kathy! Useful for getting cabs??

[Karen in Ohio]

So Hank, you sing songs using just the first letter of each word, but you can't carry a tune? They should have hired you at Guantanamo. ;-)

Congratulations to everyone who got a prize.

[Kathy Sweeney]

Oh yeah. Even better at concerts, games, and in emergencies when someone needs to clear a path. Cracks me up because after I do it, people look around to see where the whistle came from, and they never expect me. hee.

[Kerry]

Wow - I am stunned! And so excited about getting Nancy's book! Thanks to Hank and all the tarts for the great fun. I would also just like to say that I am in awe of (1) anyone who can play ANY musical instrument, must less that many; (2) anyone who can qualify for the Olympics (would love to see a blog about that!); (3) anyone who can bench twice her body weight; and (4) anyone who can whistle. Of course, all the Tarts are awesome :)

Something you probably don't know about me is that I'm a certified charm school graduate. My sister says I need to practice more, though :)

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Back from Washington DC--and lovely to be home!

More PRIZES! Karen in Ohio wins a set of three Charlotte McNally mysteries...PRIME TIME FACE TIME and AIR TIME!

WInners of an ARC of PRIME TIME:
Avis
Debby
Alan P
Chris V
Laura in PA

Winner of a t-shirt that says: Ask Me What I'm Reading--William Simon

More winners to come--watch this space (Well, not exactly THIS space, but a similar space coming later today.)

And hey, we're stll waiting for you to tell us all something about YOU that WE didn't know!

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Hmm..don't know how the whistle thing got left out..thanks, Kathy! And Kathy, I searched and seached for a photo of you..without success. Is there one in that secret suppply cabinet you guys haven't told me about yet?

[marie]

Congratulations to all the winners! Somehow I remembered that Elaine married her professor but some of the other dear Tarts' accomplished are fun and exciting too.
The only thing that people may want to know about me is that I almost entered the convent to become a nun but then figured that I wouldn't make the required silence rules. Oh well, I get to read all the great books and blab at nauseaum about them to anyone who will listen.

[Karen in Ohio]

Ha, Marie, that's hilarious. I aspired to be a nun, as well, until I remembered they weren't allowed to do anything with boys!

Thank you so much, Hank! Now I can share your books with my mother. She'll love them.

[Cassie Christopher]

I can introduce myself in Chinese and sign language SIMULTANEOUSLY.

[storyteller Mary]

My fun fact: at age five I tried to join the chimps as they left their show at the St. Louis Zoo. If my mom hadn't stopped me, I could have been in show biz.
Deer: Many more deer tracks today. Someone suggested setting an alarm to get up early but I hate alarms*. I did wake up at 6 a.m. and looked out the bay window -- but no deer. Maybe I'll leave curtains open or sleep on the futon to increase my chances of spotting them. They've been coming close to the house, maybe because the snow isn't as deep and they can nibble grass? The Indian corn looks untouched . . .
*My final year of teaching, I raised my fist and swore, "As God is my witness, I'll never set my alarm for 5 a.m. again." My first period class applauded.

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Cassie, that's TRULY impressive! Is there a video?

Kerry, what's a charm school? I'm not sure I knew those really existed. (Except in Nelson DeMille, of course.)

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Mary, the getting up early thing is a whole nother blog. I had an eight o'clock class in college--German--to which I wore my pajamas and a trench coat. I literally got up at 7:58 and stumbled downstairs to the classroom which was on the first floor on my dorm. It was pitiful.

[Harley]

Cassie, I want to see that too!

[Karen in Ohio]

You're just showing off, Cassie! LOL

A friend's son can play one song on one instrument while simultaneously playing another song on a harmonica (with a stand). That is almost as impressive as your ability.

Another friend used to run a charm school, which was an adjunct division of her modeling agency. Which was my employer for a short time, when I modeled shoes. See, I wear a size six shoe (which is ridiculous for someone of my height), and that's the size they use for shoe models. Who, along with hand models, make about 25% more than other kinds of print models. (That's print, as opposed to runway, which is a whole 'nother ballgame.)

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Karen,You wear a SIX? And did you get to keep all the samples? Sigh. (I wear a nine and a half. Does that mean my feet are more than one-third larger than yours?)

Winners, don't forget to email me through my website! More winners to come--stand by!

[Shel Franz]

Wow, skip a day checking this site and miss out on all sorts of goodies. But I can get in on the tail end of the fun! I have size 2 1/2 feet. Yes,I mean little girl's size. Try finding a pair of pumps that size. I dare you. I can sometimes wear a size 5 women's if they run small, but online or mail ordering shoes is completely out of the question. So, if y'all see a 43 yr. old woman running around in Big Bird shoes - it's probably me.

[Paulina]

Congratulations to the contests' winners! It was a real fun even though I hardly guessed anything.
As per personal talents. Haven't got any.
If I go back through the years, I can say that I was quite good in writing essays, compositions and papers, especially in literature. I wrote for myself and for a friend of mine who was a bit hopeless in this. My literature teacher always read my compositions out loud in the class. I've had it up to here with listening over and over again to my stuff that I started trying to write worse. It worked sometimes: compositions were not read but I was still getting good grades.
When I was 7-10 yo I was excellent in chesses. I won every time I played the game and was advancing constanly. At school they wanted to find a personnal professional coach for me and send me to a special school where they study the math in a very serious manner but I was terrible at math. After having heard all this, I gave up palying chess completely.
One more thing, according to my husband's very subjective opinion, I'm very good at delegating duties.

[Laura (in PA)]

Dang, yesterday was a bad day to miss.

Hmm. I have nothing interesting about myself to share. I can read well upside-down (the writing, not me), does that count? I can also reach 10 keys on a piano, because I have man-hands. And I can reach to the tops of my kitchen cabinets without standing on anything, because I have very long arms, to go with my man hands.

Kathy, my sister can whistle like that. And she's short and innocent-looking, as you are. It came in handy for her as the mother to 3 rowdy boys.

I'm very excited about winning the ARC. Thanks, Hank! :)

[Rita Scott]

Geez, I don't think I got any of them right!
I'll have to think about any talents I have LOL!

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

MORE WINNERS! (from the UNDO!) contest

of QUARRY, the anthology of short stories by New Englnad writers...including my story "On The House."
(When true love goes wrong, a woman's best friend may be her dog. Or--not.)

Judy Merrill Larsen
Maryann Mercer
Arkansas Cyndi
Nancy Cohen
Laraine

(You can start reading the story on my website!)

Winners--contact me through my website and send me your snail mail address!

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Shel and Laura--we missed you yesterday! I thought I noticed you were not in the room...
Shel, you wear a size 2 and a half shoe? Is there any time that it's terrific?

[Kerry]

Charm school was punishment inflicted on me by my mother because I was too much of a tomboy. Its official title was (and I swear I'm not making this up, and expect to read a version of it in someone's book someday!) "The Wendy Ward Sugar and Spice Princess Charm School." It was offered through the Montgomery Ward department stores (mostly as a way to get a bunch of adolescent girls to buy white gloves, I think) and offered such scintillating classes as "how to sit properly" and "how to get into a car in a miniskirt while keeping your knees together" and "what the hell are all those knives and forks" and "how to walk like a model so you can embarrass yourself in front of your family at the end-of-school fashion show". I managed to convince my mother to let me skip that one.

It didn't help with the tomboy thing, which seems to have now reached its ultimate expression in weight lifting and martial arts.

[Pam aka SisterZip]

I have two totally useless talents:

a) tripping up stairs (the boys followed me between classes in high school; those miniskirts we wore, doncha know) and
b) I do a killer Edith Ann impersonation (Lilly Tomlin...Laugh-In...). I even have a costume & have performed on occassion (when fortified with at least 4 whiskey sours and long ago when I could still fit into the costume).

But other than that...

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Kerry, that's amazing, I mean, so evocative of a certain time, and so hilarious, in retropsect, that such a thing existed. And I truly truly hope it's the title of your novel. If not, may I have it? :-)

Pam! Now THAT's a talent! One ringy-dingy?

[Rita Scott]

Kerry - my Mom signed me up for one of those too! (not that name tho, TG LOL) It was at Famous-Barr. I pissed off the store people by wearing an ice blue cotton sateen shift I had made, instead of one of their cute Bobbi Brooks outfits for the fashion show. LOL
I did think of one hidden talent, but it's in the 'me, Margie, Please don't tell us!! category' bwahahaha!

[Doc In CA]

Talents and such...hmmm

Well, I can speak in at least a couple dozen accents, including regional ones.

I can do vocal impersonations of quite a number of famous people. My Sean Connery, Droopy Dogg, Boris Karloff and Mickey Mouse are pretty popular.

I'm pretty darned hard to kill, be it by the hand of my fellow humans, the forces of nature or, most often, my own stupidity.

My biscuits won the blue ribbon in the youth division at the Yuba County Fair when I was 12. I was one of only 2 boys going up against 14 girls.

The same year I won the blue ribbon, my friends and I built a giant kite that took one of my pals on a short, but wild ride a couple of hundred feet up into the air.

As for other talents, well, they are best not spoken of in polite society:)

[Marie]

Modeling school high-jinx jogs my memory of signing up with my friend early on in the sixties. My friend was a beautiful five foot eight modeling candidate and she dragged me along for support. The head of the modeling agency looked at my five foot frame, suppressed her laughter took our registration fee and began the class. She did a demonstration of the book on the head walk, pointing our toes the correct way and always feigning confidence at all times. At the end of the first class the owner told me that there was not a lot of demand for petite models but I could continue and learn model tips. My friend continued to attend, my family avoiding laughing at me and I contiued to feign confidence at all times.

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Bobbi Brooks! I haven't thought about that for a long time. Like--what was the place that made the cardigans with the grosgrain ribbon trim?

Doc, the biscuit story is adorable. What's your secret? Can you still make them? Your kite escapade, though, is a bit reminiscent of balloon boy, no?

[Laraine]

The one 'talent' that I feel quite comfortable asserting without feeling that I'm bragging or making things up is that I am very, very good at FINDING things. I once found a tiny little computer chip that had flown from a colleague's hand into the deep snow at the bottom of the outdoor stair case that we were standing on, maybe 20 feet. Anyone who has spent much time in snow knows that that wasn't that spectacular, since the snow was well-settled and relatively firm, so the chip's descent left a tiny pathway to the bottom. But, nonetheless: lost your keys, your medicine, a precious heirloom, whatever? I almost always can walk into the room/house and find it. Started to say 'lost your shirt' but decided that, metaphorically speaking, there's not much I can do about that.

[storyteller Mary]

Shel, does that mean you can buy those light-up shoes? I keep wanting those in my size . . .

[Avis]

Things you might want to know about me... hmmm. I'm very good at untangling very fine chains, and love to do it. I like taking things apart and putting them back together. I used to beg my gramps to let me put his cancelled checks in numerical order. I can make owl hoots through my cupped hands. I taught myself to tat (using an instruction book), and can cane chairs (and knit and crochet and embroider).

Doc in CA's Droopy imitation makes me laugh out loud. :-)

And thank you for awarding me a prize, even though I didn't post yesterday! It must have been for something else. (There is only one Avis posting here... right?)

[storyteller Mary]

Rita, I've heard that you make the best catnip toys in the world!

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Avis, it was for the UNDO blog! And yes, it's you.

Finding things, Laraine? Whoa. Fabulous. Can you come to my house?? I have a whole list for you! Starting with the other earring to the gold ones with the dangles, my t-shirt from the Zucchini festival, the other black bootie shoes, and the red shawl. Where where where? But that's a blog for another day.

[Doc In CA]

Hank, I haven't made biscuits in the last 30 years, so I reckon that recipe is lost.

The kite incident, unlike that balloon boy thing, involved a 20X35 foot kite made of bamboo, black plastic, baling wire (we were all country kids) and several hundred feet of light nylon rope. Plenty big enough to lift a 90 pound boy, especially when towed into a 40 mph wind by a Honda 90 trail bike going flat out (about 50 mph).

However, you'll note that I made no mention of a tail on the kite. That was an unfortunate design flaw (along with the unforseen inability of the rest of us to hang on to the the fast moving rope) that made the flight short and memorable. Amazingly, Tim was physically undamaged at the end of things, tho I think he may have wet himself. Mentally, he was pretty twitchy for a couple of months.

[Rita Scott]

LMAO Doc! Sounds like something my cousins would do!
yeah, I do deal drugs for getting cats stoned LOL
Make homade biscuits & can refinish furniture. (and would like to shoot Martha Stewart for telling people to paint furniture!
Once stripped 17 coats of paint off a beautiful golden oak table! grrrrr)

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Doc,m that is qyite a tail..er, tale. xox

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Okay, then, that'll teach me about the preview function.

I meant:
Doc, that is quite a tail..er, tale. xoxo

[storyteller Mary]

Avis, the tatting alone should earn you a prize. We tried it in our Readers and Stitchers group, and only one person actually succeeded. You rock!!

[storyteller Mary]

Hank, your mention of the UNDO blog led me back for a look, and this question: "Someday..tell us what you do when someone says:Mary! And you think: oh no. (This is a constant dilemma for me.)"
I am honest and upfront about my name dyslexia, and am overjoyed if I actually remember any names. I'll admit to forgetting and ask for help, and people don't mind (well, my sister might, but I can usually get hers). A friend will be cute and say, "I know I've heard your name, but I've slept since then," and the Apple greeters will looked a bit dismayed and ask us to "remind me of your name." Another storyteller tries to share something he remembers about the person when caught not knowing their name.
I just read in Reader's Digest that the problem with names is that they have to be exactly right, not just the right meaning as with common nouns . . . much tougher.
Hope you are still checking in . . .

[Pam aka SisterZip]

I remembered something else my friends told me I'm good at...remembering absolutely the most useless stuff. But I do fairly well at trivia nights.

...and that's the truth! {{sticking tongue out}} plbbbbb!

[Laraine]

Hank, check the lining of one of your purses (dark fabric lining) for the other gold earring of the dangly ones . . . it's a long shot, but it is the first thing that came to mind when I read your comment. Wish I could help with the other stuff, but it will have to wait until I could set foot in your home, as I'm not accustomed to doing long-distance finding. But thanks for setting this great conversation in motion. I'm awed by the Tart talents, as well as those of my fellow backbloggers!

[Elaine Viets]

Marie and Karen in Ohio -- I didn't realize we were potential sisters. I wanted to be a contemplative nun -- a Pink Sister. But then I discovered boys.
Fun contest, Hank. Thanks for the revelations about my blog sisters.

[Amy]

Two days late and two dollars short, I guess. Like Harley, I can do cursive mirror writing. In 12th grade English, my teacher would discipline us by making us fill out these sheets with little squares on them. None of the squares could have a recognizable number or letter and each square had to be unique. So I got in trouble for talking and crudely gesturing to my nephew a few aisles over about Mason and Julia finally giving in to passion on "Santa Barbara" (cave sex, anyone?) and had to fill in a square sheet. So in mirror writing I wrote a rather flirtatious letter to the teacher. Little did I know the vain bastard had a mirror in his desk and he read it on the spot. Oh, well. Years later he admitted he wanted a good go at me, and years after that he went to jail for child porn. Spew.

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Laraine! Whoa. I didn't find the earring there, but I did find Jonathan's MEDIC alert thing, which was SO lost we ordered another one. And then--yikes. You allowed me to find it. You are GOOD. (thank you!)

[Shel Franz]

Mary, well, I *could*, but I don't suppose my husband would find it amusing...LOL!