Jenny tagged me for this book meme ages ago, and I finally have the teeny bit of leftover brainpower to do it.

Here are the rules:

1. Grab the nearest book of 123 pages or more.
2. Open it to page 123.
3. Find the first 5 sentences and write them down.
4. Then invite 5 friends to do the same.

The book I’m midway through reading is Embryo Culture: Making Babies in the Twenty-First Century, by Beth Kohl. I read about this book over at my location-doppelganger Mel’s a week or two ago, when it was being reviewed by the Barren Bitches Book Brigade. Here’s an interview with fellow Badger Beth, and links to lots of other reviews.

I’m not done with the book yet, but so far, I think it’s a fantastic read, deftly bridging the gap between personal memoir about the experience of infertility and both failed and successful IVF, and well-researched cultural critique.

Here’s the meme quotation from Embryo Culture:

Weekend well spent, we’ll drive home, and for the next ten days I’ll go about my business knowing intuitively that I am with child. Examining packages of boneless, skinless chicken breasts, ordering books of stamps, I’ll be focused inward, even as my glow emanates out to the world. On the eleventh day I’ll administer a home pregnancy test. The result window will immediately turn hot, hot pink, setting all sorts of records for the quickest and most undeniably positive result, which of course I won’t realize, knowing only that it works just like they say it will on TV.

I’ll bake chocolate souffles and nestle the test stick inside Gary’s serving, spooning extra whipped cream on top.

I’m going to tag Mel (do you play internet memes, Mel?), Cindy, Clare, Lesbian Dad, and because talking to them unexpectedly was the absolute high point of my week, Levi’s Moms. (Either or both, but I imagine Mama Mindy is more likely to play. Especially if she’s not done writing whatever it was she was not writing when she called.)

Anyone who would rather not play on her own blog is welcome to play in the comments here, and anyone I didn’t tag who thinks it sounds like fun, please pretend I tagged you.

And by review, I mean the first sentence of the first post of every month in 2007. (With some artistic license — one or two of these were from the second post of the month, and I always skipped the memes/silly internet quizzes.)

January: Every year since 2004, Jill and I have created a “possibility for the year.” It’s the broad context in which our plans and resolutions etc take shape.

February: I was so sad this morning, when I heard that Molly Ivins died yesterday.

March: I had a nice long weekend update typed, including a blow-by-blow of my amazing success at the giant multi-family kids consignment sale yesterday, when it disappeared into the ether.

April: Noah is turning into SUCH a little boy.

May: I need a clever title for a book chapter.

June: Today is the second annual Blogging for LGBT Families Day, sponsored by Mombian and the Family Pride Coalition.

July: I just finished participating in a 3 week fitness study at my local Curves.

August: Hanging out with Grandma and his mommies this afternoon, Noah found a phone. (Edited to add, “and dialed 911.”)

September: This message is being auto-posted while I am retreating.

October: A lot of you know that I’m a wannabee librarian, I love libraries (although I hate giving books back), and I generally think that librarians rock.

November: It’s 5:01 am and I’ve been up for an hour and a half.

December: I have been getting up and going swimming at 5:30 am at least 3 times per week for the last month.

Yes, I know it’s 12/23. I’m a little late. We’ve been busy with this whole Christmas thing, plus the progesterone supplement I’m on makes me t.i.r.e.d. And Noah is sick, poor guy.

It’s still a fun project, even late, so here are the next 10 states:

1. Hawaii: On the list of places I haven’t been, and I still regret that I didn’t go when Kevin and Erin were living there. Or for Christa’s wedding.
2. Illinois: Growing up in Wisconsin, the first thing that comes to mind is FIB, but since that’s both negative and general, I’ll add my most recent significant association with the state. Early in my career, I was lucky enough to get to argue a case before the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, which sits in Chicago. The oral argument was scheduled for days before Kevin and Erin’s wedding, so I had to pack for both and go directly to the airport from court. Also, I forgot to pack my shoes, which I was going to wear both during the argument and in the wedding.
3. Indiana: I have to admit, Indiana has mostly been a drive-through state for me. Two real-life friends have ended up there (Purdue and IU) and more recently, I’ve become online friends with new Mama Frema.
4. Iowa: Even though Iowa shares a border with Wisconsin, I never thought of it as nearby. My main personal memory is driving through it with my grandparents who lived (at the time) in…
5. Kansas: Heh. See Above. The coolest thing about visiting my grandparents in suburban KC was neither the barbecue nor the music. It was the fact that they had a wholesale floral business that they ran out of their home, so their bedroom had a greenhouse attached. And they had a beautifully landscaped back yard full of brick paths that were perfect for children running in circles.
6. Kentucky: On the way home from Kevin and Erin’s wedding, my flight was delayed in Cincinnati. The airline put us up in a dismal hotel in Kentucky. (Kevin & Erin show up in a lot of these locations!) Also, my first year of college, I was friends with a guy named Victor who was from southern Floyds Knobs, Indiana, whose main social outlet in high school was the Kentuckiana Mensa Society. Don’t ask me why this belongs in the Kentucky section, it just does.
7. Louisiana: When I was 7 or 8, we went to New Orleans, probably for the ABA Annual Meeting. I was allowed to get one souvenir, and I made my choice too early, asking for a green and purple beribboned mask-on-a-stick. The next day, I saw a paper doll book of old-fashioned southern belles. My parents held firm.
8. Maine: When I was 15 or 16, Maine was nearly the last state on the continental US that I’d still never visited. Dad decided he wanted to go to the Bay of Fundy, which has the most extreme tides in the world. On that trip, I also used my extensive knowledge (ha!) of extreme heavy metal to talk to some French Canadian teenage boys who were also camping nearby. Their English was only marginally better than my (non-existent) French, but fortunately as teenagers, we had the universal language of rebellious music.
9. Maryland: I heart Maryland. Especially Takoma Park, but Baltimore will always have a soft spot too. If money were no object, it is entirely possible that Jill and I would buy a cute little cape cod in Takoma Park and live happily ever after. Preferably right around the corner from Levi and his moms.
10. Massachusetts: I heart Massachusetts, too, but not enough to live there, even with the enticement of marriage. I graduated from college in Massachusetts (with Erin!), and lived there again for 6 months or so during the year after I graduated. Shortly after I moved back to Wisconsin, a bunch of my Wisconsin peeps moved there; Dave remains there still.

Sort of in the spirit of those “where have you traveled” memes, I’m going to spend the next few Fridays making lists of places I’ve traveled and some specific memory or association I have with each place.

I hope some of you will play along too. (It doesn’t have to be on Fridays.) If you haven’t gone to all of these places, say something about why/why not, what you hope to do if you do travel there, or what you associate with the place. No 2 word cop-out answers, please!

Today, 10 states, plus a bonus — the District of Columbia, in alphabetical order:

1. Alabama: I don’t actually have any specific recollection of visiting Alabama. But seeing as I went on so many driving vacations with my parents as a child, that’s got to be when I’ve been there. I think we should do a weekend trip sometime soon, since it’s not a terrible drive. And I’ve always wanted to go to the Unclaimed Baggage Center.
2. Alaska: Never been there, either. My Dad and I used to talk about driving the Alcan Highway. We better do that soon, Dad, or global warming will end our chances!
3. Arizona: Ah, Arizona. Much of my favorite political organizing in grad school took place at a US Student Association annual meeting at Northern Arizona. Plus I drove through on my way home from California after September 11. It was in a Borders in Flagstaff that I realized all the maps in the US had been purchased by stuck people who decided to drive home earlier than I decided to drive home.
4. Arkansas: On a trip with my grandparents when I was about 11, we went to some crazy theme park. It was based on a cartoon about southern hick characters, I think? EDITED TO ADD: Dogpatch, USA, the Lil’ Abner Theme Park. Thanks, Andrea!
5. California: Where I was stuck September 11. Where many of my friends in the computer live. Where I met one of Levi’s Moms, while I was roommates with his other Mom.
6. Colorado: My most memorable trip to Colorado is back when I was probably 9 or 10. We went to Mesa Verde and saw the cliff dwellings, and we went to Four Corners, where you can stand in Colorado, Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico, all at the same time.
7. Connecticut: Many, many, many flights in and out of Hartford “International” Airport during college….
8. Delaware: My lovely wife and I spent our honeymoon at Rehoboth Beach. (Thanks again, Mikki, for lending us your condo!)
9. District of Columbia: It always aggravates me to see DC left off of lists of states, although technically, it isn’t a state. And I prefer to see it here in the alphabet, rather than down at the end near Washington state. That’s where I lived for ~4 years (Capitol Hill & Shaw/Truxton Circle; not counting the year in Takoma Park, MD or the year in Reston, VA), where I bought my first house, where I met my lovely wife, and where we legally changed our names.
10. Florida: My maternal grandparents moved to Florida when I was about 14. They lived in Eustis for a few years, and then moved to Lake Wales. My grandfather, uncle, and aunt still live in various parts of central Florida. Also, I celebrated my 21st birthday at Disney World. With my grandparents.
11. Georgia: Home, home on the range. Where I never expected to be. Where Noah was born, where I have a nice home….

Anyone else want to play? Isabel, Reno, I’m especially looking at you! (I’ll move on to international locations once I’m done with the US.)

Thanks, Sandra, for this fun Silly Internet Quiz — Which Goddess Are You?

Shockingly, I came up Athena, Goddess of Wisdom. (Here’s the part I couldn’t figure out. The question where you suddenly get some cash, there was no “buy books” option. I picked jewelry as the best available option.)

I’m also working on a meme of my own. Look for it tomorrow.

I got tagged by Steph! For an entertaining meme where I tell you 7 weird or random facts about me.

Steph approached this meme in a very interesting and fresh way — she picked 7 dates in the past and described what was going on in her life at that time: 35, 30, 25, 20, 15, 10, and 5 years ago. So I’m going to copy that, agreeing with her logic that *something* about that is likely to produce random facts about me.

1) November 1972: I turned three years old, living with my parents in a duplex in Milwaukee. By that time, I was going to the Highland Community School, a very cool Montessori school in our neighborhood. My teacher, Tim, lived with his family in the same duplex. (Actually, I don’t know exactly when Katie and her family moved out, and Tim and his family moved in.)

2) November 1977: I turned 8 years old. My family had moved across town into a single-family home. It was the second year of Milwaukee’s school desegregation, and I was in the 4th grade at Lloyd Street School. Most of my friends from the neighborhood school I’d attended also switched to Lloyd, but we didn’t have classes together. I’d skipped 1st grade, so at this point, I was 1-1.5 years younger than most of my classmates. Two years later, I demanded to be allowed to repeat 5th grade so that I could be with kids my own age. I still don’t know how that worked, but it did.

3) November 1982: Rough year. My Dad ran for Congress in 1982, and lost in the September Democratic primary. Out of 13 candidates, he came in second. It was hard as hell on the whole family. I was in 8th grade. Around this time, the gym teacher pulled 6 or 8 of us girls out of class and made us talk about cliques and gossip. After the second time, I asked her why I was there, and she told me she wanted all of the popular girls to be in the discussion. I was totally shocked that she saw me as a popular girl.

4) November 1987: Fall of my first semester in college. By this time, I’d figured out that Reed was NOT where I belonged, that my roommate was a thoughtless bitch, and that I was too far away from my friends and family. But I had already made a lifelong friend, who took my out for my 18th birthday and made me feel special and loved.

5) November 1992: Fall of my first year out of college. I was BACK at Reed, working as a “Resident Adviser” aka live-in dorm supervisory staff. Reed had never had anyone like that before, and it was insanely controversial: the students who liked me introduced me to their friends as “Liza’s the fascist adult who lives in Foster-Scholz!” They hired me because the pressure was intense to hire both a woman and an alum, but no women graduates actually applied for the job. I was the closest thing. And I was completely miserable — it totally affirmed my decision to leave in the first place. I quit after the first semester.

6) November 1997: Fall of my first year out of law school. I was working for a small civil & constitutional rights law firm, and dating a man whom I fully believed I was going to marry. The innumerable levels on which we were wrong for one another were still hidden from my view.

7) November 2002: Jill and I were engaged, but not yet living together. Hee-hee. Isn’t that sweet? But the main reason was because her busy season kicked in days after she proposed, and we hadn’t had time for her to move. Also, my then-boss and I were absolutely not understanding each other, and we were both miserable. Jill took me away for a long weekend, the weekend after my grandmother died. When I got back into the office, we had a huge confrontation that was the end of my official lobbying career — in January 2003, I took my first corporate job and discovered that I loved it. (And that boss? We are still in touch and have a fine relationship now that I’m not miserably working for her.)

Who can I tag? It seems like I’ve read this meme on tons and tons of people’s blogs. Leave a comment if you haven’t been tagged and want to play. Or if you’re a non-blogging commenter, feel free to answer in the comments.

I promise, there will be a real post by tomorrow morning.

In the meantime, here’s a very funny silly Internet quiz courtesy of Shelli. They didn’t have my absolute favorite alcoholic beverage (a toss-up between New Glarus Brewing’s Uff-Da Bock and their Wisconsin Belgian Red) but they had a mighty fine selection.

It would take 19 bottles of Pete’s Brewing Winter Brew to kill me

Heh. That’s what they think. I think the real number is closer to 5 or 6. My BlogHer roomie may recall the loopy damage that 2 gin & tonics did to me last summer. As far as drinking goes, I am a lightweight.