8 Random Things About Bill Blunt

Just when I thought it was safe to hide in the corner and rest my quill a while, I discover that my fellow curmudgeon Archie has also tagged me, this time to tell the world 8 random things they don't know about me. I have spent an hour or two writing a couple of dozen things down, and I have asked Mrs Blunt to draw them randomly from my late Uncle Jesmond's old cloth cap which we keep in the back of the sideboard for those occasions when we are asked to be random.

1. For a brief period I kept a cree of pigeons
2. I lust after leek pudding, a dish rarely seen on any menu these days
3. I am inordinately proud of my three fine children, but I would never tell them that to their face in case they developed inflated egos (which I consider to be one of the worst vices in humankind)
   
4. I have never been awarded a state honour
   
5. I won the 1956 Fitton Hill Junior's 'Most Mischevious Metaphorist' competition
6. I quit smoking in 1979, 1984, 1989, 1993, 2005 and 2006. I plan to do so again later this year
7. I am starting to get addicted to the quite enchanting writings of The Domestic Minx and worry that Mrs Blunt will discover this at any moment
   
8. I once almost had the chance to steal a plaque from the Empire State Building

As I am now all tagged out, I do not feel in all honesty I should tag anyone else. While I understand this may condemn me to rot in some kind of dungeon in the blogosphere, forever cast aside for my 'bad form', it's a risk I am prepared to take.