Honesty is the Best Policy

The wonderful DJ Kirkby has awarded me this gong, for which I feel truly honoured (that DJK notices my existence is an honour in itself). The requirements for receiving it are as follows:
1. List ten honest things about yourself (try to make it interesting, even if you have to dig deep!)
2. Pass the award on to ten other bloggers

Okay, here are the ten things:
1. I am a recovering obsessive, by which I mean that I now know myself to be obsessive, and try hard not to be. I also know many of my obsessions to be an unbelievable waste of time, but I still find it incredibly difficult to avoid them.
2. My house is an utter tip, despite tidiness being one of my obsessions. This causes me huge stress!
3. I dislocated my sacrum (the lower part of my back) at the age of twenty-four, and have suffered from almost constant pain since. It enrages me to see people lifting things using their backs - they have no idea what they are risking. USE YOUR KNEES. PLEEEEASE!!!
4. I cannot work without music on - it occupies that other part of my brain that would otherwise be drifting/worrying/obsessing. I listen to the same tracks over and over again and, according to iTunes, some have been played over two thousand times [gulp].
5. I envy women with loving mother-daughter relationships. I did not get on with my mother.
6. I love playing with Lego (having a six-year-old son is a real boon).
7. I have a passionate love of walking in the countryside - the more mountainous the better.
8. Despite having been writing since childhood, I was 35 before I realised that I wanted to be a Writer.
9. In real life, I earn my living as a web-designer, which panders wonderfully to my desire for perfection; there are endless opportunities for tinkering with a website.
10. When I was a child, I dreamed a lot about flying (I could take off, although not always successfully, by doing breaststroke into the air). I almost never fly these days, but I still dream very vividly - in Technicolour and with full Dolby Stereo.

And here are the ten other bloggers:
Debs, Liz, Karen, Helen, Maddie, JJ, Sally, Sprial Jen, Lane and Womag