Tag from Lucy's Island: Fours

I only just discovered that Lucy of Lucy's Island tagged me. I haven't been tagged for anything for a long, long time. So here we go. Thanks, Lucy. You make me smile.

Four Jobs I’ve Had (okay, five)
1. CASHIER at the Co-op grocery store in Geneva, Switzerland. On the Route de Florissant, and also down by the lake, and also in Vandoeuvres. For eight weeks the summer I was 16. Because the rule was that in our household once you turn 16, you get a summer job every summer. At least I think that was how it went. In any case, it was neat to earn some real money all my own, and to be able to tithe from it. And I liked trying to make customers smile, just by smiling at them and being as pleasant as possible. Some pretty sour-looking people came through my checkstand, and often left looking a little more upbeat, which was great to see.
2. SECRETARY-TYPE for Executive Business Services (again in Geneva), a little secretarial company that also did travel arrangements. It was my next summer job, when I was 17. Part of it involved walking upstairs to bring faxes and other paperwork to an elderly gentleman in a richly furnished office, and then listening to him talk for quite a while about his planned travels to Billings, Montana for whatever reason. My bosses told me just to go ahead and listen for as long as he wanted to talk, to keep him a happy customer. It was a strange arrangement.
3. SECRETARY for Digital Equipment Corporation in Massachusetts. Replacing someone during maternity leave, I think. Answered phone for boss, did filing, typing, reworking file system, etc, in Corporate Travel and Relocation Departments. This was the summer I was 18.
4. ADMINSTRATIVE GOPHER PERSON (notice pattern) for World Economic Forum in Geneva again (stayed with my brother and sister-in-law, since my parents had moved back to Massachusetts the year before). Did a lot of typing. Got really fast at typing the word "international." Quit a couple weeks early since I couldn't stand being across the ocean from my future husband for as long as I had previously thought I could.
5. WIFE, MOTHER, HOMEMAKER. It goes without saying that this is the most challenging and diverse job. But not without its administrative parts and the need to make people smile.

Four Movies I Watch Over and Over Again (okay, over five)
1. The Princess Bride (our whole family loves it; so funny and romantic)
2. Pirates of the Caribbean (I just love it; again, funny, romantic, such a sense of honor)
3. The Lord of the Rings trilogy (seen it 4 times so far; incredible for me, given the length; I've written posts on this before)
4. Singing in the Rain (love the singing and dancing and romance and humor)
5. I also really like the Bourne Identity and its sequel (totally different from the book, which I read afterwards and consequently didn't like as much as the movie), The Incredibles, The Rookie, and True Lies, the old Sabrina and the first Zorro. Generally, I like movies that honor marriage, families, parenting, integrity, and faithfulness, and that have romance, honor, and humor. But I also like action movies. Mostly I like watching movies with my husband. Except he likes some movies I don't care for due to their brand of interesting humor. But I won't mention those here, because they don't belong in this category.

Four Places I’ve Lived (okay, seven)
1. Framingham, Massachusetts (birth to age 2)
2. Geneva, Switzerland (2-17; I am in love with the memories of my happy childhood there)
3. Northampton, western Massachusetts (college) and Harvard, eastern Massachusetts (not the university, the little town where my parents moved after my freshman year of college)
4. Nashua, New Hampshire (newlyweds; no flowers six months of the year)
5. Highland Park, Illinois (flat, long winter)
6. Silicon Valley, California (Cupertino and Sunnyvale; great climate, surrounded by hills and near the Pacific Ocean, fresh fruit and flowers all year, never any snow, literally no rain from April through October, every cultural experience you could wish for, great concerts, great restaurants, well connected airports, and unbeatable homeschool support and activities. But smog, noise, congested roads, crowded, cramped, light pollution, and possibility of earthquakes; ten years there was perfect)
7. Montpellier, southern France (current location - great language, food, history, Mediterranean Sea nearby, short hop to lots of countries; kids learning French in local schools)

Four TV Shows I Watch (okay, zero)
1. I
2. Don't
3. Watch
4. TV (even if I wanted to, we don't have any reception and we don't want to subsidize TV by paying for cable, and I already don't have enough time to blog and read the books I'd like to read)

Four Books (okay, 12)
1. The Bible (I try to read it through once a year or so, weekly sharing favorite verses with friends)
2-4. Nursing your Baby and Toilet Training in Less Than a Day and Dare to Discipline (these really helped me in the baby and toddler days)
5-12. Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow (Orson Scott Card; fascinating), Blink (Ted Dekker, NOT the guy with the big hair), The Light of Eidon (Karen Hancock), Safely Home (Randy Alcorn), Oxygen (John B. Olson and Randall Ingermanson), Code to Zero (Ken Follett), Timeline (Michael Crichton)

Four Places I’ve Been On Vacation (Or at least four groups of places. What a life I've had so far)
1. Europe (Italy, France, Spain, England, Ireland, Scotland, the Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, Greece - the blessing of growing up in Europe)
2. Kenya (when I was 12 and 14, on safari with family and friends)
3. All over the continental U.S. (Maine, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Alabama, Florida, Illinois, Wisconsin, Colorado, Arizona, Washington, Oregon, California, Tennessee, Virginia, New Jersey - the blessing of having lived all across the country and having family and friends all over), plus Canada (just a couple of days for a film festival with my mom and toddler son - we were moral support for a Christian filmmaker) and Kauai (first trip away alone after we became parents) and Maui (10th anniversary)
4. The Caribbean: British Virgin Islands (honeymoon in 1993, and also my brother's wedding in 2000) and Jamaica, Grand Cayman Island, Mexico, Puerto Rico, St. Thomas, Bahamas (blessing of two staggering business trip cruises that the family got to go on), and also Bermuda (blessing of parents sending us away for an anniversary)
I've never been to Australia or Asia (but my husband has been to both on business trips), nor South America. But still, I would say I am nothing if not well-travelled, for my thirty-three years.

Four Vehicles I've Owned (wow, this actually IS exactly four! For once!)
1. Beautiful Blue Toyota Tercel (in Massachusetts; stick-shift, no A/C, no power windows or anything else, 2-door)
2. "Dark Emerald Pearl" (Blackish Green) Toyota Camry '92 (in New Hampshire and Illinois and California for 10 years; automatic)
3. "Salsa Red" Toyota Camry '02 (in California, then sold the beloved thing to my uncle in Massachusetts before moving overseas; automatic)
4. Green VW Passat (in France; back to stick-shift! I can't decide which kind of transmission I like better. They both have advantages; I think it's good to be experienced with both)

Four Websites I Visit Daily (on average)
1. Google
2. Typepad
3. English-French dictionary
4. I don't read blogs by going to their websites. I read them in my aggregator by RSS feed. But my aggregator visits lots of places (about 53) daily. Every 30 minutes, in fact. If only I could catch up with it. 88 unread at the moment. I hope I finish this post some day so I can get back to reading. Been working on it on and off for days, since I what I am REALLY doing this week is scrapbooking urgently so I can give my family back the use of the dining room table by Friday night when Jason returns from his ski trip and we are four diners again.

Four Favorite Foods
1. Chocolate
2. Chocolate (and nuts)
3. Chocolate (and cheese, but not together)
4. Chocolate (and whole wheat things, whether together or not)
4.5 Lots of vegetables, yogurt, fruit juice, pasta, rice, and salad

Four Places I’d Like To Be Right Now
1. Here, right where I am, 'cause that's where I'm supposed to be
2. With my husband anywhere
3. With my mom
4. With God in heaven - very much looking forward to that ('cause He said He's taken care of the travel arrangements and the passport control situation)

Four Bloggers I’m Tagging
I think everyone's already done it and I'm the very last one. And phew, I made it before the world ended.