Welcome to our weekly Boredwalk Community series, where we ask Boredwalk fans fun questions! This week we're talking to Tricia K. of Oglesby IL, showing off a Amateurs Wait for Inspiration shirt.
1. What's your actual day job and what's your dream day job?
I give tours of the Hegeler Carus Mansion in La Salle, Illinois. It’s 144 years old and almost entirely original. Awesome place, though I wish it was haunted. My dream day job? Hmmm…that’s actually a tough one, because I’m one of those intolerable jerks that already loves their job. Although if someone paid me an obscene amount of money to read books and watch old cartoons all day….
Oh, and I’m also a professional storyteller. And I dog-sit. I get to do all the stuff I love. Pthththth! (Ed. note: The number of non-haunted mansions in this country is too damn high!)
2. What's your biggest pet peeve?
Going to the fridge for an ice cold soda and finding the last one’s been taken. That really gets on my nerves…especially since I live alone. (Your roommate sounds like a grade-A soda scoundrel!)
3. What's a book that you think the Boredwalk community should read?
Stephen King’s Skeleton Crew. It’s a book of short stories, so even the easily distracted can get hooked.
4. What's the most useful piece of advice you've received?
My father once told me, “What others think of you is none of your business.” It was great advice, and I listened. Granted, he also told me to leave his ‘damn power tools’ alone, and I did not listen…which explains the belt sander scar on my leg. (Ouch! Well, hopefully that incident built some character where your flesh used to be.)
5. What experience do you most want to cross off your bucket list?
I would like to meet author Stephen King and not act like a total jackwagon in front of him. (Is "jackwagon" a technical term?)
6. Clear up a misconception (about your job, where you are from, some other topic you know a lot about).
Arsenic wasn’t only found in Victorian wallpapers; you could find it in your chocolate bar wrappers, your candles, hats, socks, children’s toys, hair ornaments, dresses, curtains…the possibilities for poisoning you/your family were endless back then! (They really knew how to party in the 19th century. Here's to living dangerously in uncomfortable clothes!)
7. Where can the rest of the Boredwalk community find you?
I don’t do the Facebook/Twitter stuff, but I do have a website: BlarneyTales.com. You should also check out HegelerCarus.org. Killer cool old house, no joke! (Well, wait for the stay-at-home orders to be lifted. Bookmark it for your next trip to or through La Salle, IL!)
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