I found a list called “The 25 most popular icebreaker questions based on four years of data“. So I’m gonna post a few, and see what happens.
Your mission: answer the question in the comments with a good story.
If you don’t have a good story, you are encouraged to make one up.
Who had the most influence on you growing up?
The inventor of the cardboard refrigerator box.
I spent half my childhood playing with those, because I lived across the street from a Montgomery Ward, so I’d steal them out of their trash whenever I could.

That cardboard box story is actually a child’s dream come true. For the rest of us, how often could deliveries of refrigerators in cardboard boxes happen?
Mr. Whipple.
Sir Isaac Newton, with his gravity and momentum equations …. at least for the most memorable teachable moments.
My Grandma. A cup of black coffee goes well with any meal.
Old Grandad.
It’s a toss-up between the heavy set lady at child services and the scowling, hard of hearing judge.
My psychopath brother (I’m serious about that) and a couple of seventh- and eighth-grade classmates, who taught me that evil is an active force in the world.
And Claudia Cardinale, if you know what I mean and I think that you do.
This is pretty hard for me, because, as far as I can tell, I didn’t grow up.