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Stole this from Os and he was gracious enough to give me a letter. So here it goes...

This is how it works: Comment on this entry and I will give you a letter. Write ten words beginning with that letter in your journal, including an explanation of what the word means to you and why, and then pass out letters to those who want to play along.

TENACIOUS: That sounds better than "hounding" right? Throughout life I have always been persistant when my mind is made up. I once wrote "The Greek" (the head trainer for the Denver Broncos) and Mike Shanahan letters every two weeks to try to get an intership with the team in athletic training. I didn't get an intership but when The Greek came to Helena that summer I had a personal audience with him. Last year when I had a boss who preferred I hadn't been there, I pulled up my boot straps and held to my morals to make it through. Tenaciousness is a good thing.

TACKLES: as in football. I LOVE the sound of a good hard hit on the football field. A bit on the morbid side but there is that sudden collision of forces that makes my blood rush. I don't want to play football, just revel in watching it. My favorite place to watch it from...the side line of course in case those tackles lead to an injury.

TEA: From late September until about mid April I have a hot cup of tea nearly every night before bed. It started in college when we had a hot pot to boil water. It use to just be plain Lipton Tea. As I have gotten older, my taste in tea has changed. I like tea that comes in silk tea bags, tin canisters, flavored. My current favorite is Ginger Peach. When I don't have hot tea, I have hot cocoa. Something about going to bed in the dead of winter with a little warmth right in your middle. Comforting.

TACOS: One of my favorite foods, but I'm picky about my tacos. My favorite is a homemade taco bravo. Start with a griddle, coat it a bit more than lightly with vegetable oil. When the oil gets hot, lay the small soft corn tortillas on it. Let them get slightly crisp on one side while the softer "up" side bubbles. When you take them off only lightly dab with a paper towel and fold in half. Then fill a regular hard taco shell with meat, then cheese, then onions and then only a VERY VERY light sprinkling of lettuce. Add sour cream, guac and black olives. Then smear the inside of the slightly cooled soft shell with refried beans. Fold it over your loaded hard shell. Enjoy with ice cold Kokanee (A Canadian Glacier brewed brew that I can not find for the life of me here in Minnesota)

TROUBLE: I was always called a goodie twoshoes growing up because I listened to my parents, got good grades, and didn't break the rules. Now, I'm an adult. I'm educated. Now...I like to cause trouble. I prefer to call it making waves, or causing a stir. When something strikes me as unjust or unsupported or simply opposes common sense I will make ruffles until I get the matter fixed. Some cause that "making trouble". If "making trouble" is what it takes to get ridiculous polices and procedures changed, I'm going to continue making trouble.

TRUSTWORTHY: I'm trustworthy to a fault. People can trust me to the core. But on the other hand, I trust others often too willingingly. I like to believe that others live their lives with the same morals, standards, and expectations which I have. I've been burned more than once...they don't. So if you are looking for someone to lean on, I'm a good bet but after getting burned too bad a few times don't be put off if I take a while to trust you.

THUNDERSTORM: My favorite weather anomaly. My favorite place to listen to a thunderstorm...in a TENT. I love the heaviness in the air just before the clouds let loose. I love the pounding of big, fat raindrops splatting on the side of my tent. And the smell of damp earth after the big storm. All my favorites. If there is a smell to "green" it is the smell that you smell in Glacier Park after a huge downpour complete with echoing thunder off the rocks.

TEARS: I don't cry very often anymore. Use to all the time...a happy Disney ending, a puppy or baby commercial, movies, someone being nice. A good two months of pretty much constant tears when my husband left me pretty much dried me up. Now, it just seems like too much energy to cry again. I cried today though. The one thing that can make me cry 100% of the time is when I get very very mad. It has happened for as long as I remember. I get thoroughly, completely ticked off and about the time I'm about to spew what I'm really thinking, the tears well up. Any one know how to turn that faucet off?

TOMATO: a favorite "little kid" memory. Old style school lunch ladies (they made things from scratch!), spring, fresh garden tomatos, sliced thick and sprinkled with sugar. Yummmy!!!

TRAILS: Where I like to go when I need to think, re-energize, re-organize my head. Preferrably a less frequently hiked trail, preferrably somewhat darkened with overhanging trees. I like to just walk, find a cool rock to sit on, write in my journal, take nature pictures and walk the trail. Feels better when I'm done.