25 at 25

1. I paint my toenails to look "salon-quality" using stickers from CVS.

2. I have run three half marathons. Slowly. I stopped running due to blisters. Now I do kung fu.

3. I'm not very touchy-feely. This I blame on my parents, who I am suspecting grouped me with baby brother Dally and raised us as one boy...

4. ....yet I own a fairly extensive doll and wig collection.

5. I will marry the love of my life in May. He gets me to the core. I want to be better when I'm with him. And no one makes me laugh harder.

6. I developed a strong fear of guns after taking a Social Psychology class (where I heard the statistic about being more likely to shoot yourself or your family).

7. When I was little I wanted to be a cowgirl. I'm still secretly a little country and I love rodeos.

8. I will get my first passport next month. The farthest I've gone abroad is Rocky Point. My first country of choice would be Italy.

9. I love to read Martha Stewart Living, though the recipes are too complicated and my motor skills too unrefined to do the crafts.

10. I rode a horse in a parade a couple years ago. However, I was in the wrong spot because the horse would not leave his friends.

11. I talk in my sleep. The weirdest thing I remember saying is that there was a zucchini jamming my bedroom door.

12. I often am told I look like Drew Barrymore.

13. I lived in Florida for three months. A hurricane hit my city while I was there. Nothing really happened.

14. I played All State trumpet in high school. I was also a drum major.

15. My cousin Brooke died when she was 9 after a lifelong battle with cancer. I was 8. She was my best friend.

16. When I was little, I had straight blonde hair and brown eyes. I now have naturally dark curly hair and green eyes.

17. I deeply admire my four older sisters, who are all very different.

18. I adore and feel very protective of baby brother Dally.

19. My favorite songs are very sad and usually about heartbreak.

20. I am a trivia fanatic. Tony and I often win trivia games.

21. I have fairly straight teeth and fairly horrible eyesight.

22. I studied journalism in college. Three years after I graduated I left journalism.

23. I have a fear of heights but have no problem with planes. I once rode in a helicopter with no qualms. But I would not want to go in a hot air balloon.

24. I have interviewed Bill O'Reilly, Kathy Lee Gifford and the trainer of Whiplash the Monkey Who Rides a Dog.

25. I was once an international hostage when a group of angry shrimp fisherman blockaded the only road out of Mexico.