70 Things You Might Not Know About Me

There things about ourselves we love and that make us who we are. But, we hide those things that make us unique behind a veil of “professionalism,” and it's keeping us from truly standing out and making a difference.

Want to listen? There's an audio version below (with extra flavor!)

I recently published this post about how impossible it is to be truly different in this world. I mentioned that the things which make us unique are often the things we hide because we don't want to be embarrassed or made fun of.

Our quirks are our personality.

And, in that post, I encouraged, well, challenged really, you to share something about you.

So, to lead by example, I decided to come up with of things that I don't share that often. Some of them might be embarrassing, other might just be quirky, but they're all things about me that my friends appreciate (or only tolerate) and which make up Ellory Wells.

70 Things You Might Not Know About Ellory

1. I'm a cat person and a huge sci-fi fan. Our cat, Boomer, is named after a character in Battlestar Galactica.
2. I've seen every episode of every Star Trek series, except Deep Space Nine and the original series.
3. I own every season of Will & Grace on DVD.
4. I have a very dry sense of humor which I often hide because a lot of people don't get it. My dry sense of humor was called “deadpan” in a job interview, and it almost cost me my job.
5. I'm rarely in a bad mood, but I'm not a “high energy” type of person.
6. I suck at golf, but I still love to play.
7. My mom tried to teach me how to play the piano, but I refused to learn.
8. I started a fiction novel which had a plot eerily similar to a show that came out on TV four years later.
9. The first beer I ever tried was Miller Lite; I hated it.
10. I'm quite introverted (but I hide it well).
11. I don't like crowds. In groups of 5, I'm comfortable. In groups of 6 or more, I stop talking and retreat inside my head. I told you I was introverted.
12. I've been told, more than once, that I ask too many questions.
13. I don't consider myself as being “creative.”
14. I love playing video games. I always buy both of the premium consoles (i.e. Xbox One and PlayStation 4) because there are too many good games for both.
15. I love watching movies.
16. One of my favorite movies is The Count of Monte Cristo because of the fantastic character development of the main character, Edmond Dantès.
17. I've built at least two computers from scratch.
18. I've been fired from more than one job.
19. I only buy and use one kind of ink pen, the Pilot Precise v5 Extra Fine, and almost always in black.
20. One of my favorite pastimes is enjoying a cigar with friends and just talking.
21. I only have two stations on Pandora, one for work and one for play.
22. I used to go deer hunting every Thanksgiving with my grandpa, then my uncle.
23. I get annoyed when people can't drive or park.
24. I can quote almost the entire movie Serenity.
25. I hate it when people talk during movies.
26. I've been skiing over 15 times. That's snow skiing, I cannot water ski.
27. I sometimes ask questions I know the answers to just so I can test the other person.
28. I drink my coffee black because that's how my dad used to drink his.
29. I often keep the boxes for things I buy because I don't know if I'm going to return the item or not.
30. I've broken my website (more than once).
31. My first website was not the idea I initially had in mind, and it isn't what you see now.
32. I've cut my own hair, every two weeks, for almost 10 years.
33. Ellory isn't my real name (just kidding, it is); I like to play tricks on people.
34. I wasn't popular in high school. At all.
35. I was bullied, a lot, in middle school.
36. I don't like the texture of shaved coconut, but I enjoy eating it in large chunks.
37. I went on 2 mission trips to Haiti while in high school.
38. I went on 3 mission trips to Juarez, Mexico while in college.
39. I gained 40 pounds my freshman year of college by lifting weights 3-4 times a week.
40. I was a solid B and C student in college because I never saw the value in most of what I was learning.
41. In college, I lived on top of a bathroom for an entire semester.
42. I hate paying to park.
43. I hate buying things I know I'll replace later, so I rarely do it.
44. I'm very skeptical when I get an email from someone I've never met.
45. I've read most of the Hardy Boys books.
46. When much younger, I used to read aloud to my cat, Snowball, to improve my speaking skills.
47. I know very little about how to do maintenance on cars. I don't even change my own oil.
48. I'm very self-aware, but also fairly self-conscious.
49. I give my closest friends nicknames and sometimes they don't know.
50. My confidence is often misinterpreted as arrogance. However, it's just that I know what I'm good at and try to avoid the areas where I'm weak.
51. I give everyone a hard time. If I'm not teasing you, I probably don't like you.
52. Despite having experienced a lot of success in my business, I still have self-doubt and worry that it will all end.
53. I got Lasik eye surgery when I was 22 years old. I consider Lasik a miracle of modern technology.
54. I'll become an uncle later in 2016.
55. I got my first speeding ticket 2 weeks after I turned 16, and I lost my driving privileges for 6 months.
56. I got into 100% of the colleges to which I applied.
57. After graduating from college, I worked off and on as a substitute teacher for 6 months. I hated it.
58. After graduating, I also worked at a cigar shop. I loved it. I met some incredibly interesting people.
59. I've never been a morning person.
60. I have performed on stage in front of over two thousand people. Also, while in high school, as an individual performer, I ranked in the top 12 of all high school students for reading poetry. The funny kind, not the sappy kind.
61. I used to build and paint model cars, planes, and helicopters.
62. Sudoku puzzles confuse me, and I have no idea how to solve them.
63. Without spell checking software, I'd never know how to spell the word “guarantee” or “restaurant.”
64. I don't have a birthmark.
65. I've only broken two bones – the growth plate in my right arm and my right big toe.
66. Wasting time really bugs me. That's why you'll often find me carrying my backpack with me because it contains things for me to do.
67. I don't have many friends; I keep a small, close circle. I'm very friendly and have lots of good acquaintances, but I closely guard my inner circle.
68. In my life, I've had 7 different cars. 2 got wrecked (not my fault) and I drove 4 of them until they died. The 7th car is my favorite and I'm still driving it.
69. I really enjoy learning. I once read the featured article on Wikipedia's main page just so I could learn something new.
70. I almost always carry a pocket knife, except when I have to get on an airplane.

How many of these things did you know already? How many were new?