Random Tag

This tag is courtesy of Ballon Pirate. It is seven completely random things about myself. I am to tag seven people, but most of you already read Balloon Pirate, so you're tagged already.

1) I swam through these rapids at high water. They are class 4 rapids at high water.

These rapids are almost a half a mile long at high water. The waves are 3-6 feet. The small dot you see in the right picture is a canoe, and the left picture is taken from a bridge over roughly the middle of the rapids. I have canoed through them probably a hundred times. Only spilled twice.

2) I have flat feet.

3) I have been around the planet a couple of times. All the way around it. Half-way round both ways a bunch more times.

4) I was in a store that was bombed in Johannesburg during the apartheid struggle. I missed the bombing by one day. I had gone there to pick up a purse for my Mom while flying to where they were in Africa doing development work. Mom's purse strap had broken and they couldn't get decent purses where they were. She was pleased with my selection both on the basis of style and of size and number of pockets (Mom's purses were more of a fashionable ladies camera bag than a purse...).

5) I used to wear a pocket protector for awhile in high school, but decided that while it had high utility value in protecting my pocket, it was decidedly nerdy and had to go...

6) I worked in radio as an announcer for awhile while in high school. I did Sunday church broadcasts. My father found substantial ironic humour in the fact that I would darken the doorstep of a church for cash. He could never get me to go otherwise. FYI: it is the Catholic Church and its hierarchy I have a problem with, not God or Jesus.

7) While I am a firm proponent of gun control (even firmer than current Canadian law), I am fully trained and was quite competant with firearms - handguns and long guns (single shot, semi-automatic, and automatic). I am also trained in unarmed and stick combat, though I'd be hard pressed to do any of the above well - having not practiced in a decade. I used to live/room with a guy who trained various city police and national police in those activities.