Thank you for all the AMA (Ask Me Anything) questions on my Fifteen Year Blogiversary post! The two winners were D in Texas and Mica. Here are the questions and answers.

Odie asked, what is your favorite memory of your time in Italy? All the dumb inside jokes from when Steven, Mom, Dad, and Christina (snister) visited in March 2006. I wish my blog writing style then was more similar to what it was now, so I had them documented better.

Florence, 2006

Christina (Snister) asked:

1. What is your favorite blog post you’ve ever written? The first one that comes to mind is “Watch out for popularity contests,” because it’s authentic and sassy, and got a big (for me) response.
2. How many posts do you have total? As of today, 4,358 (468 on kimhastheruns + 3,194 on ilaxstudio v 2.0 + 696 on ilaxstudio v 1.0).
3. What’s the longest you’ve gone between posts? 8 days in July 2017.
4. What about your blog/blogging has brought you the most joy? Three answers: having a place to say what I want, documenting my life, and connecting with people!
5. What has been the hardest part of your blogging journey? The hardest emotional part has been so many people quitting blogging, or switching to monetary blogging (which I don’t enjoy reading). I miss their stories. The hardest technical part is everything, ha. I used to teach it to myself but am over that. Now I hire out help and I don’t get how it all works anymore and it frustrates me.

Stephany asked:

1. What’s one thing you do to keep your relationships strong and happy? I make notes of things that are important to people and follow up on them. People are always surprised when you remember something they told you and ask about it!
2. What’s one of your most controversial opinions? That animals are not for human consumption, labor, testing, material use, or sport.
3. What book has had the biggest impact on you? How Bad Do You Want It?, a spots pyschology book that I’ve read several times.

Kapgar asked, why the Facebook hate? Ha, in the giveaway post, I said not to leave entry answers on Facebook because it’s easier for me to track them all here than in two places. That’s it! (Although now that I’ve quit my part time job, which is the main reason I kept Facebook, I’ve been thinking about quitting Facebook.)

D in Texas asked:

1. Are you comfortable disclosing a more exact location? I grew up in NE IL and am curious. No one has ever, EVER mentioned Grayslake in a blog post before that I’m aware of. Yeah! I live in unincorporated Zion, just east of I-94. We moved there four years ago from western Round Lake. I taught at a home studio in Grayslake for seven years, and Steven’s business is there.
2. I was a runner (plodder) for a few years but now I’m old and worried about my joints. Any advice? I do walk daily. Good for you for walking daily! That is awesome! My advice would be all the things we are supposed to do but don’t always (myself included) – strength training, stretching, a warm-up and cool-down, focusing on a pace that works for you, focusing on your form, eating a healthy diet, staying at a healthy weight for you,  getting enough sleep, resting (from exercise) when you need it, and cross training. As I am getting older I’ve noticed my body wants longer to warm up before I run and I am not giving it to it, so I don’t feel warmed up until four+ miles in to a run (usually). And I am a plodder too! I have heard people talk about different drugs for joint pain relief, but I don’t have any experience with them.
3. Can you divulge more about your day-to-day worklife? Yeah! I’m an interior architect (sigh, but they call me interior designer) for the federal government. I assist federal clients with developing their space requirements, the design of their space, and their furniture requirements. And now a big part of my job is procuring and overseeing installation of furniture. My day-to-day is very project timeline based and changes each day depending on what is going on with my projects. I have meetings with clients and internal meetings and also spend time reviewing submittals and doing paperwork.

Mica asked:

1. Do you prefer cooked or raw potatoes? Cooked, unless I am with Mica, then raw.
2. Did you ever find a place as good as the Mediterranean one where we met that first time in Chicago? NO! SADNESS!!!!
3. Which of the “Fast and Furious” movies is your favorite? Fast Five! I love them all (except 2-4, ha) but really thought it was fun when they switched to the heist story-line in Fast Five, and when Dwayne Johnson joined the cast.
4. Do you ever decide not to finish a book, and if so, what’s your criteria? (I think I’ve actually asked this before, sorry!) I do! I stop it when I dread reading it, or when reading it makes me angry. I want to look forward to reading. Right now it’s an enjoyable escape for me and I’m going to abandon a book if it feels like too much work.
5. If money were not a factor, what job/activity would you want to do? I’d be a tour guide.

Shelley B asked:

1. How old were you when you decided to become vegan? 25
2. Are you still on your vegan donut quest? I am! Whenever I got somewhere new I try to find a vegan donut to try. My last chance was Atlanta and we didn’t make it, but we did go to a vegan restaurant.
3. Would you consider getting a dog, or are you strictly a cat person? I would not because I am a LAZY person and cats are low maintenance compared to dogs. Ha! (Which sounds nuts because I seem like the perfect candidate for a dog – I am home a ton, and love to run and be outside, but nope, lazy.)
4. If money and training were no issue, what would be your dream race? Oooo. I actually loved the NYC Marathon so much I’d want to do it again. Or maybe the Rome Marathon, since I lived there for a while.
5. What is the meaning of life? To make connections and share joy with other people.

Kandi asked:

1. Do you plan to run another marathon if races begin again? Yes, if I can maintain a healthy-for-me weight for a while, I’d love to!
2. What’s your favorite podcast? Ooo, hard one to answer. Probably The Popcast because it makes me laugh, with I’ll Have Another in second place.
3. How did you choose your college major and career? I was somewhat interested in Architecture and decided to give it a try, ha. Then the firm I worked for was the ONLY place that gave me an interview, since the owner also went to Iowa State University. I did public and private commercial interior architecture there, and was a contractor for the federal job I have now. Then someone at the federal job poached me and now I’ve been here for 11.5 years!
4. What’s the best thing you purchased recently? A massage
5. How many cats is too many cats? Humans in the home x 2 = maximum cats in your home. There’s two of us, so we could have four cats! (I figured each human has two hands so they can have two cats, ha.) Five cats would be too many.

Amy asked, 

1.  did you ever consider stopping your blog, and how come? Not seriously considered, but there have been moments where I am so frustrated with a technology thing that I want to throw in the towel, but I get over it.
2.  what kept you going all these years? The need for a place to document my life and express myself, and connecting with people.
3.  how many blog friends have you met IRL? At least 20. Some have become very close friends – I am currently vacationing with one of them!
4.  what is the weirdest comment you ever got on a post? Ha, that was not spam, right? The weirdest ones are the ones were someone obviously skimmed just to leave a comment but the comment doesn’t make sense.
5.  who is your favorite Star Wars character? Princess Leia.

Marty asked,

1. How do you get all of your cats get along so well? Oh gosh, this has nothing to do with me, unfortunately. They hissed at each other for a few weeks when the kittens moved in, but are now besties.

 
2. Have you ever considered being on Twitter? Not recently. I had an account for a couple of days or weeks when it was newer, but didn’t care for it. I don’t want another social media thing to “check,” but people have sent me funny stuff from Twitter, so it could be amusing!

Julie (my mom) asked,

1. I’m just curious do you have a favorite topic to write about? Yeah, I really enjoy writing my data-focused weekly workout posts, but those are the least commented on – because they are boring data-focused posts! But I like logging and keeping track of things, so it brings me the most joy.
2. Which family member is the most fun to write about? I love sharing all of my family members! Christina is probably the most fun to write about because she’s always doing cool stuff, and she and I are always laughing about something stupid I feel like I should share here.
3. If you could run anywhere in the world and with anyone dead or alive who and where
would it be? I would love to run with Shalane Flanagan, my favorite retired professional runner, maybe where she lives in Oregon!
4. What is your dream vacation? A secluded tropical island with overwater bungalow.
5. Who are the top 5 people in your life that have influenced your blog writing? Ooo, good question! That is hard! Dave at Blogography was the first blog I ever read, so definitely him. I am sure some teacher whose name I can’t remember influenced how I actually write.I have seen styles of posts I like and don’t like from specific bloggers which has made me think things like “I should never write a post that long,” or “I should use shorter paragraphs” or “this is a fun way to share information.” I can’t really think of people specifically. How horrible! I will update this if I think of more!