The crackiest of the crack

I have been meaning to concoct a list of my favourite places to lurk stalk visit for quite some time now. This Last week several weeks ago, the cosmos collected, combined & conspired to smack me in the head!

Like many, I have a lengthy blog roll. But these are the ones that make me stop and say "ooo! New Post!" Yes, literally. (When I'm at work, I manage to confine it to "ooo!" so as to minimize the firing-potential. Except that of course, I never, ever check anyone's anything from work. 'Cept that new guy in accounting. And not his black, black heart, because as we all know, accountants have black. black hearts).

These are on my iGoogle feed, beside the news, weather, urban word of the day, "cool tools", & "IKEA hacker". As well as several other "self-help" blogs that I routinely ignore [note to self: clean up iGoogle crap]. I don't feel I've done any of them justice in my explanations. They just seem to... resonate. Explore! Enjoy!

Lifecandy - my dealer pusher mentor in all things digi-social or socio-digital (I made them both up, so they are equally correct) Nenette will always take the top spot in any of these dorky lists I make up. That didn't sound right, but I'm leaving it, because she is just generally too hot to be negatively affected by the term "dorky". She gave me an awesomely outrageous Rockin' Blogger Friendship (I added the "rockin'" because she called me rockin' and who am I to argue?) award this week. I would totally spread around & give it - twice - to any of these contenders - including back to her if it were allowed - but I can't figure it out. She would totally show me too if we could get it together to get together. But we both have kids. In soccer (I fukkin hate soccer - there, I said it). And my questions are so stupid immature infantile let's just go with stupid, that they just can't be covered in 140 characters.

Still Life with Wyliekat - I originally thought she meant that as in a painting or photo (like a snap-shot of life). I just recently found out she means it more like "Life Goes On". She said it as she was expounding about getting older... [ppbbbtthhh] I find Wylie very grounding.

If That Ain't Country - Here is why the Cosmos allowed me to drag my ass on my high-five list. I'd like to say that I just discovered her, but [sniff] she actually discovered me. So then I discovered her back. And we've been discovering each other ever since. That sounds way worse than it should.

Diary of a Modern Matriarch - "You like drinking? HEY! I like drinking!" And you love your kids enough to kill for them but are still once in a while surprised you haven't eaten them yet? Me too! But really, her kids make my ovaries hurt.

Planning Queen - "Queen" is really a bit too modest, as it implies mortality. I'd use "goddess", myself. An excellent calm, rational parenting reference, I feel like she is the neighbourhood "together lady" and I am the drunk neighbour that stumbles over and says obnoxious things. Don't believe me? Check out my comments. Seriously, she's got excellent, simple ideas for child & family engagement. One of my favs is the family meeting.

The Bloggess - Was trying to avoid The alpha-bloggers because you know... they're so alpha. There are lots of good writers out there. Bloggers with Highly Developed Senses of Opinion. In the fourteen years since the invention of the internets (for me, anyway. First thing I did? Ego-Google. Except Google wasn't invented yet, so it was called an ego "search" [gasp]) I've seen a lot of stuff that made me laugh. Unfortunately, that has made me jaded. Jenny makes me cry big fat can't-breathe-or-make-intelligent-sounds tears (that's laughing, although it tends to sound more like the furnace seizing).

So The Fish Said - well, we've broken the alpha seal, so what the hay. Another one that has made me develop & repeat the mantra "Three kids is enough. Three kids is what we wanted. Three kids is probably three more than we can handle." She somehow makes NOT being an Uber-mom Uber.

lookin' for a dude... lookin' for a dude... ah! here's some dudes:

Rude Cactus - Another alpha. I guess there's a good reason why they're alpha... I don't want to blow his cover, but I've actually never seen anything rude there, so it's actually been highly disappointing. I do know enough that he'd probably take "blow his cover" and twist it around, so I guess some might consider that a little rude. Maybe it's about expectations.

Marshall - Not alpha, because Marshall is famous in *real life*. But as you know, real life has little relevance in the blogworld. His blog would be much better if he'd stop writing that damned book and work on it a little more (Marshall, if you're reading this, stop reading this and get back to work on that damned book. May 2010? Are you fucking kidding me? yes, I know the draft is "off" - we'll talk later of my issues with not being cc'd on that - but can't you edit, or nag or press-flesh & speed things along a little? Seriously. Stop now & get on that.)

Oops. That's more than five. You people all suck. Stop being so interesting. OKOK I take it back! Keep being interesting! I love you all! You know, in a non-creepy Internet-love kind of way. YES a non-creepy Internet-love IS possible. I just invented it.

Are You Experienced?

I listen to my iPod constantly and am always mentally categorizing songs and artists into my own piles. So I thought I'd share some of my categories.

Five Bands that I Can Listen to Just About Anything From:

* The Tragically Hip - the CRTC rules on Canadian content on the radio has elevated some real dogs to "success". TTH is not one of them. Every time they come out with something new, I think to myself "yeah, I guess they've run their course" and then about a week later, I find myself loving the new stuff. They grow on me and I almost never turn the radio away when they're on. Their concerts are even better.

* Pink Floyd - growing up waking to my Dad blaring obscure Pink Floyd albums - yes, I said "albums" (and I said "obscure") on Saturday mornings can do things to you. Good things.

* Jimi Hendrix - Also growing up, Jimi was one rock artist that my Step-Mom liked (really liked). So I got to listen to a lot of Jimi, and found that old-people music didn't always suck! And he died on my birthday (not the actual day of my birth, and I don't know why I feel the need to point that out) so I feel like I have a connection (yeah, it's weak).

* Santana - You can pair just about anyone with Carlos and he sucks magic out of them. I even like his Chad Kroeger stuff (see below). I never particularly liked Matchbox 20 and I thought it was because the singing was kind of, um whiny. But Santana can pull a whole new sound out of Rob Thomas. Even (c)rap artists benefit!

* Maroon 5 - Now, one might suspect my reasons for appreciating this particular artistic group could be less than - uh - artistic in nature. I can assure you that my "appreciation" of the physicalliosity of certain individuals within this five-some came after I realized I really liked several songs on the radio, picked up the CD and then realized I loved the whole thing. Not just the music, but the poetry within, and some of the best song lyrics I'd heard ("the sex she slipped into my coffee". And I love how they STILL play "not fit to fuckin' tread the ground that I am walking on" on the radio). THEN I saw a video and forgot what I was talking about.

(Honourable Mention) *AC/DC - I realized a long time ago that they had a formula - but I really liked the formula. When I say just about anything, it's a stretch but the library is so great that there's always something I can crank.

Five Bands That I Can Listen to Just About Nothing From:

I've tried to think of unique reasons for each the following, but I can't without going into a rant about overrated hacks who crank out the same singles again and again. We don't need to hear that five times. There are of course, dozens of artists who would fall into this category (I mean, there's whole categories of country, country-rock, country-pop hybrids). I only include those that, according to the programming directors of the radio station(s) I listen to, I should like. [Don't tell me what to do pin-head]

* Nickelback
* Rush - ok, their stuff is at least a little varied.
* The Guess Who [may get some home-town hate-mail. Give your head a shake people. Because we were on the map once? They sang about Saskatoon for crying out loud!]
* Red Hot Chili Peppers
* Metallica - "King Nothing" is a rare exception. [I'll know Max will have read this when I get served with divorce papers.]

Five Dirty Little Secrets [be ashamed for me]:

I've just included five, to limit my shame [for today]

* Justin Timberlake
* Christina Agulara
* Pussy Cat Dolls
* Duran Duran (a BIG Duranie in high school. BIG. Hair, white blazers & everything... eyeliner. Oh yeah... no photos [thank you sweet baby Jeebus!])
* Kylie Minogue