I do love Saturday

1. Yesterday, I linked to the journal "Mall Of America," a collection of photos from shopping malls of the 1960s and 1970s.  What store do you associate most with your childhood in terms of happy memories and why?  Is the store still around?  "Dispensa's Castle of Toys."  It was, aptly named, a castle a few miles from our house, and it was nothing but a toy store.  It was huge, and it had everything.  If I remember correctly, the castle was painted pink.  There was even a drawbridge and a moat.  I always ran past the door into the place, because there was a gate with spikes raised at the top of the door, and I was convinced I was going to be impaled.  When I was about ten they opened a small amusement park next to the castle.  Everything closed a few years later, the land was sold, and now there is a forty story office building there.  Though it has been gone for more than 20 years, it is still the most original store idea I have ever seen.  You can see pictures of it (and the building that is there now) here.

2. What song makes you the most emotional and why? "Wildfire"-it's so sad the way the horse runs away, and then the girl gets lost in a blizzard looking for her...wait a sec, that's the answer my brother would give if he was doing this.  I don't have a specific song that makes me verklempt, but anything on the bagpipes has the potential to get to me because it reminds me of so many things that aren't around anymore.

3. Take the quiz:  What year were you born under, and what year should you have been born under?  I was born under the Ram, and I do seem to have the characteristics it describes.  I should have been born under the Ox, and I see nothing that I am compatible with there.

4. What time do you typically wake up each day?  What is the latest you're normally able to sleep?  How many hours of sleep do you get in an average night? I wake up seven different time per week.  I can sleep anytime, anywhere, anyhow, so long as my body wants to.  Lately it hasn't wanted to.  We need to have a nice long talk.  I probably average seven hours a night.

5. What frightens you the most about getting older? That I won't make it to "old."  If I do get there, I am not looking forward to the gradual decline of my physical self.

6. READER'S CHOICE QUESTION #56 from Debi:  If you found the house of your dreams, right price, then discovered that a murder or suicide had taken place in the house, would you still consider buying the house? What's done is done.  As long as everything has been cleaned up and there is no possibility of a repeat performance, let's bring in those trucks.