Do you really need to know more weird things?

I was tagged by my old high school friend Sara (no h, she feels very strongly about this) to discuss 7 weird things you didn't know about me. This worries me, because to disclose even more things that make me weird than you already know means that they have to be very, very weird. I realized that the only way to accomplish this is to talk about my absolute most weird stage of life- elementary school. I was a very strange child, with even stranger interests. Thus, I bring you:
Strange Things I Was Obsessed* With During Elementary School

1. Saints- particularly saints of bizarre things, or saints that were protectors of obscure people. For example, Saint Roger the Whoremonger.

2. Chopin- I blamed my nerdom on my parents, because in my formative years I listened to cassette tapes about the lives of classical composers. Then, I saw a PBS movie about Chopin and his romance with George Sand. I immediately developed a crush on the pale, malingering actor playing Chopin. Tuberculosis is HOTT.

3. South Africa during the fall of apartheid- this obsession resulted in me writing a first person account of a journalist in South Africa for a honor's english project with almost no research. When I read an actual book about the apartheid I was pretty impressed by my accuracy. Because it's so hard to predict poverty and racism during apartheid. Child genuis, I'm telling you.

4. Stigmata and weird religious phenomena- People who manifest the wounds of Christ. Did I mention I have never been religious? I attribute this to a weekend I spent sitting in a motel room in Zion, Utah watching some miniseries about paranormal phenomena while boycotting my parent's hiking excursions.

5. Nazis and World War II- This doesn't actually qualify as an obsession, but at one point I remember playing "Barbie rescues the Jews from the concentration camp" with my best friend and this is the perfect example of why my best friend was truly the most wonderful person ever. She was probably the only person on the planet who found this entertaining besides myself.

6. Serial killers- I got a book by a profiler who interviewed all the major serial killers in the US, and actually read the whole thing, and then read even more books until I got a little weirded out by my own interest. This obsession makes no sense because even at the age of 10 I was too scared to stay in my house by myself.

7. Monty Python and the Holy Grail- When I was little my parents would say "neeh!" when they were annoyed by something. I thought that this was something they made up, or was a common expression of irritation. When I saw Monty Python and the Holy Grail (introduced by my best friend, another reason why she was heaven sent) I was astonished to discover the "Knights Who Say Neeh!". I ran home and told my parents that they weren't the only ones who said that! And they suddenly realized that I had been thinking they were crazy for most of life up until that point. I went on to memorize almost every line in the movie, including the subtitles in the begining (A moose named Erik!). It was like discovering the secret language of nerddom.

So there you go, 7 more ways I voluntarily allow myself to be embarrassed. Just....be gentle :)

*Obsessed being defined as checking out numerous books from the library that I never actually read, writing school reports full of made up information, and acting them out with barbies.