Sharkbait Writes

Earlier this month my friend Karen Einsel nominated me for the Liebster Blog Award, and after realizing that I had completely forgot about this post, something slapped me across the face and reminded me. So, I figured I would end the year with this fun blog award.

The rules:

Post 11 random facts about oneself and answer 11 questions asked by the person who nominated you.
Pass the award on to 11 other blogs (if you can’t find 11, that’s okay too – my revised rule). 🙂
Write 11 NEW questions directed towards your nominees. Are you seeing the pattern here?
Post the award picture into your blog.

Now that we got the rules out of the way, on with the show . . .

Eleven Random Facts About “Sharky”

1. My favorite pastime is playing video games with friends on the PS3 / PS4 / Xbox 360.
2. As much as I’ve played video games all of my life, I’ve never owned an Atari or Nintendo. I always had “the other system” when I was growing up. (Update: I found an Atari 2600 for only $30 at a local pawn shop earlier this year, 2016)
3. I’m a proud active supporter of the ASPCA. Three of my dogs are rescues.
4. I used to sell dragons at the local monthly trade shows. I had to stop selling them after the dragons kept eating the customers.
5. I owned a boa constrictor when I was a kid. And no, the snake didn’t eat the neighbors next door . . . and that’s the story I’m sticking to!
6. When my brother and I were kids, we would go “critter hunting” in the woods outside of Austin, Texas. We would bring home lizards, snakes, spiders, and even a giant centipede once (no joke)! Not to mention the coral snake.
7. One of the coolest vacations I took when I was a kid was when my family went to Guanajuato, Mexico and stayed in a castle that was converted into a hotel. The creepiest part of that same vacation was when we visited a museum that had real mummies (not the wrapped up ones, either).
8. I’ve never flown on a commercial airplane, but I have flown in a Cessna.
9. I drive a limousine (and even a hearse) on occasion for extra cash.
10. I collect shot glasses, but I rarely drink alcohol.
11. I’ve taken a drag from one cigarette in my entire life. That happened when I was about eight or nine years old. My uncle let me take a puff. I swallowed the smoke. I gagged. My eyes literally fogged up . . . and I’ve never touched a cigarette since! 🙂

Karen Einsel’s questions for me

1. If you wrote a bucket list, what would be the No. 1 thing on it? Probably to write a bucket list. 🙂
2. Favorite sport? NASCAR To play? Paintball, although I haven’t done that in years. To watch? NASCAR.
3. If you were going on your first date, what would you do to impress him/her? Hmm. That’s a tough one since I’m not the type to try and impress. I think if I focused on trying to impress her, I would just end up making a fool of myself. I would just be myself and talk. I would do a lot of listening to what she had to say, so I could get to know her better.
4. Dancing or bowling? Bowling. I would just embarrass myself dancing. Then again, I stink at bowling too. Let’s go to a movie instead. What is this? A dating survey? 🙂
5. If you could blink your eyes and be anywhere right this minute, where would you be? Sitting on a beach, earning twenty percent.
6. Favorite holiday? Christmas.
7. Are you an only child? Or first, middle, or baby in the family? I’m the youngest of three siblings.
8. How long have you been blogging? I’ve been blogging since May 2011.
9. What is your favorite word or expression that you use most often? Awesome! Could you base a short story on it? I don’t know, but if I could, I’m sure it would be awesome!
10. What color are your eyes? Brown. (Back to the dating survey, I see . . . this better not show up on eHarmony!) 🙂
11. And since I’m a horoscope junkie, what is your sign? 🙂 Gemini. I don’t read horoscopes, but in the spirit of this blog post, I think I’ll read mine. It says: “Money is a serious problem right now – but help is on the way! Of course you still need to take positive steps to ensure that things don’t get worse or return to the same point, so get to work.” (Horoscope from astrology.com) Hmm . . . that was spot on!

Eleven Bloggers Tagged

Now for my selection of 11 bloggers to pass the Liebster Blog Award to. Note to bloggers, feel free to participate if you can. If not, that is cool, too. I know how busy we can get.

Christina Esdon
Jack D. Albrecht
Lorna Suzuki
Wyatt McIntyre
Steven Montano
Justin Bogdanovitch
Spencer Brokaw
Tess Thompson
Junying Kirk
Carolyn Arnold
Shelli Johnson

Eleven 2012 Themed Questions

These are the questions for my tagged bloggers to answer, should they accept the mission . . .

1. What is the best book you read in 2012?
2. What is the best movie you watched in 2012?
3. What is the worst movie you saw in 2012?
4. If you could change one thing in 2012, what would it be?
5. Was there anything in 2012 that you always wanted to do and finally did? Was there anything in 2012 that you wanted to do, but just missed out on?
6. Did you make any resolutions for 2012? If so, how many of those did you actually fulfill? Me neither! 🙂
7. Do you know anyone who actually (really) believed that the world was going to end on Dec. 21, 2012?
8. Did you try anything new or learn a new skill in 2012? If so, what was it and what inspired you to try it or learn how to do it?
9. What was the most difficult challenge you faced in 2012?
10. What was your greatest achievement in 2012?
11. Now, look back to the year 2012. In one word, how would you describe it overall?

If you participate, please be sure to let me know when you publish your blog post, so I can read your answers. Have an awesome New Year!

First and foremost, I want to thank everyone who has been following “Sharkbait Writes” this past year and has taken the time to comment (I love reading your comments!). I am very excited to announce that TODAY is this site’s ONE-YEAR ANNIVERSARY! It’s hard to believe that it has already been a year since I started this site. I never imagined that I would have people visiting “Sharkbait Writes” from all over the world! That’s amazing! Thank you! And what better way to celebrate this day than announcing another nomination for the Versatile Blogger Award! I recently had the pleasure of receiving a nomination for this very cool award for a second time. This time Karen Einsel and Jordanna East were kind of enough to hand me this prestigious award. The “trophy” even looks different, so it’s almost like winning a different award! Yay!

Anyway, you can read my post from the previous award HERE which gives you seven random facts about yours truly. Since I’ve been nominated again you get to read seven more random facts about me. I’ll try to keep this one short (Yeah, I know… good luck with that!).

So, without further ado, here are seven new random facts about Sharky:

1941 – 2016

1. I met “Grizzly Adams” when I was a kid. When I was about four or five years old Dan Haggerty (who played James “Grizzly” Adams in the TV show “The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams) had a meet and greet at the Texas Zoo in Victoria. He was the first and only actor that I have ever met, which I thought was really cool, particularly as a little kid. Mr. Haggerty signed autograph photos for me and my older sister and also took photos with us. My sister had a crush on “Grizzly Adams” and even got a kiss. She, of course, got all giddy about that fact. I have photos stored away somewhere (this was ages ago), but at the time of this blog post, I only have a stock photo of Dan Haggerty from IMDb.

2. I see dead people. I spent several years working as an obituaries coordinator at the local newspaper. After leaving the newspaper industry, I now focus on my writing and building my home-based business Jireh Administrative Services. About a month after leaving the newspaper, one of the funeral home owners contacted me and asked if I would be interested in working for him on a part-time basis at the funeral home. Since part of my business is offering various small business support services, we agreed on an “independent contract” (really, we just shook hands after agreeing on the details) and now I have a funeral home listed among my small business clientele. I basically help out in the office if needed, help out with visitations and rosaries, play “traffic cop” in the parking lot, and drive the hearse and limousine during funerals. On some occasions, I even help the funeral directors on “first calls”, which is basically bringing the deceased to the funeral home after he/she passes away. So, I literally see dead people.

3. I drive a limousine on occasion. Just recently the owner of the funeral home that I help out at asked me if I would be interested in driving his limo on non-funeral related occasions. At the time he asked, I had only driven the limousine once during a funeral and still wasn’t very comfortable with it (that particular route we took didn’t have many turns). He gave me some pointers and told me that he really needed another person that he could call on to drive the limo and particularly needed one for that weekend. He told me the only way I was going to get comfortable with the limo was by driving it. He told me to take the limo for the day, drive it around town, practice the right turns, and take it home. He said it was free advertising for him anyway. He told me to keep it for as long as I wanted until I was comfortable with it. He encouraged me not to worry about it. Just take the car. I was a bit surprised, but how could I say no?

Pardon me, sir, but have you any Grey Poupon?

So, for the next day my personal vehicle was a $150,000 Cadillac Stretch Limo. Very cool! I drove it around town and even took it home when I needed to get some work done at the house. I live in an older neighborhood with 1950s homes, so having a limousine parked in front of the house was kind of cool. It turns out that driving the limo wasn’t as hard as I thought it was going to be, so I was ready to play chauffer that weekend. I also don’t have to worry about getting a chauffer’s license because that is only required when carrying 10 or more passengers; this limo carries eight passengers. So, if you ever need a ride… 🙂 
4. I have never flown on a commercial airliner. That’s right, I repeat that I’ve never flown in a jumbo jet before. I’ve never really had to since I’ve never had to travel far enough that I could not drive to. I have been in a four-seat Cessna, though, which was kind of a cool experience. Other than that, the only commercial flying I’ve ever done is on Microsoft Flight Simulator as a pilot… and trust me, you DON’T want me flying you across the country in a 747! Here’s a preview of my in flight experience:

5. I used to have an afro when I was a little kid. Thanks, Mom! Moving right along!

6. A family of finches has recently taken residence in a potted plant hanging above my front porch. Okay, maybe that’s not really a random fact about me, but I’m running out of ideas here. If you’ve been following me on Twitter, Facebook or Google Plus, you may have seen me post some pics and videos of a family of baby finches nestled in a little nest built within the confines of a potted plant hanging from my front porch. Here are a few photos of the little velociraptors. Click on the images to enlarge.

7. Umm… Oh yes, how could I forget? I was once a multi-millionaire for about a day. That’s right, I can honestly say that I have had the pleasure of having millions of dollars in my bank account. This is a true story! You see, my first job out of high school was as a customer account maintenance associate at a locally owned (and growing bank). My job was to verify all of the new certificates of deposit and personal loans and correct any mistakes entered by the customer service representatives. Well, as an employee of the bank I also had direct access to check my own account, which I regularly did to make sure checks had cleared, paychecks were deposited correctly, etc. Well, one day (I think it was a pay day) I checked my account and noticed I had nearly THREE MILLION DOLLARS in my personal checking account! Imagine my reaction when I saw that!

After doing a bit of research, it turns out that when someone opened up a new special account for the bank they accidentally linked it with mine as a co-owner of the account. So, not only was a now a multi-millionaire, I was also a co-owner of one of the bank’s accounts. Obviously, I had to report the error to my supervisor, but I had fun with it. I asked her what I needed to do to withdraw a couple of million dollars from my account. She looked at me like I was crazy. I told her that I was a co-owner of one of the bank’s accounts, and I wanted to make a withdrawal. She still didn’t take me seriously, so I told her to check my account and see if I was joking. Her eyes grew very wide when she saw the balance on my account and that I was listed as a co-owner of one of the bank’s accounts. She thanked me and told me that she would take care of it immediately. I laughed, but she didn’t find it very funny. She never did have a good sense of humor. So, while my mulit-millionaire status was short-lived, I can honestly say that I was once a millionaire.

So, there you have it, seven more random facts about Rob “Sharky” Pruneda. I’m supposed to nominate another 15 bloggers for this award, but since I’m such a rebel, I think I’m going to officially nominate anyone who comments below. If you comment, you are thus crowned with the prestigious Versatile Blogger award. Just be sure to let me know when you post your award, so I can find out seven juicy facts about you, too. 🙂

Thanks for visiting! Grab a piece of cake before you leave! And be sure to comment below!

Cheers!

Before you go, be sure to check out this trailer for my horror-mystery novel Devil’s Nightmare!