Ellen Ripley and others.

From Cherie Priest's blog:

So how about this? I’ve done my pop culture icon love-rambling, now it’s your turn. Who pulled the chain to light the bulb in your head when you were a kid? Go on, tell me. I won’t make fun of you for it. Ripley made me cry a little bit when she chucked the ship’s cat into the escape shuttle for safe keeping. You can’t possibly confess anything sillier than that.

Anastasia Krupnik.  She's not nearly as exciting as Ripley, but then, neither am I.  She made me realize that I wasn't alone* in a lot of things. 

*The girl brought a plaster bust of Freud home from a yard sale, for Pete's sake!  Totally the kind of thing I would have done at that age, if I'd lived somewhere where there were yard sales within walking distance.