Ooh, my first proper blog-meme!

There's this thing that most of the Real People in my blogroll do, at least on occasion. It's called propogating a meme. With LiveJournal people, it seems to be mostly posting the results of quizzes that try to identify you with the most unlikely of things. They have titles like Which Power Ranger are you? and cheese-worthy results like:

You are RED RANGER! With a strong will and fearless leadership, you are always ready for action! However, your military efficiency can sometimes leave you blind to your friends emotions.

I guess that there's some social understanding of one another that's meant to be deepened by this kind of thing, but I never really got the appeal. Which period of history are you? Which martial art are you? Which mindless quiz are you?

It's not all quizzes though—often it's chain e-mails from the 90s making a comeback. Replace my answers with your own and forward to everyone on your address book! These ones I understand a little better—at least you get some qualatitive data about your friends so that you can pass judgement on their taste in movies or what big softies they are.

I blame Kate for this.

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 3 sentences on your blog along with these instructions.

Kate's message had an additional step that told Richard not to cheat by pulling out a special reserve book that would make him look interesting.

Here's what I got:

One hallucination in particular took a strong hold on his credulity. The neighbour harkening with white face beside his window, the passer-by arrested by a horrible surmise on the pavement—these could at worst suspect, they could not know; through the brick walls and shattered windows only sounds could penetrate. But here, within the house, was he alone?

My book was the Wordsworth Classics edition of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde with The Merry Men & Other Tales and Fables by R. L. Stevenson.

I don't intend to make a habit of this, but there could always be a slow news day when I just can't resist.

Update: Fixed some broken HTML.