So I kinda mentioned a couple of months ago that I’d gotten involved in a music writer’s project. I’ve been so busy with all my other millions of jobs lately, I kind of let this fall by the wayside for several weeks, knowing the deadline for the paid part of the program was coming to an end, but that deadline seemed pretty far away for a while.

So the deadline (yesterday) came along and I hadn’t done anything in a while, so I kind of had to bust butt all day and night to meet the deadline, but I managed it (barely). It’s been a really fun project and I’ll probably continue to participate anyway as time allows. Highly recommend it for those of you other music fans and folks out there - it’s an incredibly interesting time waster, I wish I had more spare time to spend reading other people’s stuff and hope to catch up on my reading there soon.

Anyhow, if you get real bored and need something to do, feel free to go here and browse around (and if you like the site and sign up an account, go vote for my Michael Jackson “Beat It” memory if you like it ‘cos there’s a huge prize at stake in the Thriller memory contest!!!).

And now, I am going to bed before I drop dead from exhaustion. Good night (uh, morning)!

My Sunday karma is alllll messed up now. Post Secret’s not putting up the Sunday secrets until this evening.

Usually I’m there right about 2 a.m. or so on Sundays, but I happened to be asleep at the time last night and have been too busy to think about it since I woke up.  But now that I know it’s going to be so late I’m, like, super out of balance now. It feels really weird to be this late on Sunday afternoon already and not already have voyeured (sic) people’s secrets.

Feel free to leave a secret in the comments if you wish, maybe that’ll help me make it ’til tonight.

Next will be showing up on The Squirrel Queen’s doorstep and visiting Mabel…

I won’t let this become LOLz Central - well, I could, but I won’t - but some things are just better shared. :D

moar funny pictures“>

One can never giggle at enough lolcats.

Unless you’re a cat hater, I guess.

I must nap. I really must.

But have you visited Plaid Stallions?

If you lived through the Seventies once, this will make you doubly thankful that they are over and long gone in the past.

It’s a lot of fun, though, and it kills me how many of those ads and toys and things I actually do remember. Though I would like not to remember some of those clothes, that’s more like a nightmare. And check out those prices! Site’s updated daily, usually.

I don’t know if it’s because I read fast or it’s just a slow week for blogging all over, but I keep running out of stuff to read online this week.

I have already been through the archives of several on my blogrolls catching up on past history whenever I had spare time, so I went for a few more and this time have been hitting the back pages of three favorite daily spots (and probably couldn’t have picked a better three to read in the same week):

• The Dry Spot
• Rex L. Camino’s Blog of Doom
• There is No Vodka in This Kool-Aid!

Dear lord, when they find me cold, stiff, and blue, somebody please tell them I really did literally die of laughter.

His lovely wife is one my favorite people around, they have a home filled with almost as many dogs and cats as mine, and he’s not as mean as he would like everyone to think he is. However, he is indeed and most certainly a curmudgeon. And always sends me into fits of giggles.

Now the king of curmudgeons hath struck again, spreading his own special brand of Christmas cheer by reviving an old Snarl. Can’t say I’m not feeling just about as Grinch-y this year myself, though definitely not as medically paranoid…

Oh my god, I have been so out of it and frazzled the last week or so, I completely forgot to check PostSecret on Sunday. Matter of fact, I think I may have forgotten to check it last Sunday.

Horrors. Be right back.

Just a brief update on the Weekend from Hell fallout… my friend who wrecked on the way to come get me and help with my car is gonna be in the hospital for probably a couple or three days with a collapsed lung. Which is not good by any means but it certainly could have been much, much worse, and I’m thankful that was the most of it.

My car still sits (at least I hope it does) dead where I left it but you know what? I can’t do anything more than I can do, so I’m just gonna try to deal with it and try not to let it 100% wreck my week, even if it does 50%, you know. I can only do so much and I’ve only got so much money to do it with, so whatever happens happens.

Thanks everyone for the well wishes and pep talks in comments, I really appreciated it and you guys were a real shot in the arm for what has been a truly dreary weekend. You guys are terrific, all of you. My sweetie called tonight too which also helped, tho I know it’s so frustrating for him to not be here to be able to fix things immediately from afar. And thanks, Newscoma, for going so out of your way as you did, you are a gem and that was really sweet, AND I see my panic attack warranted a visit and pep talk from Weakley County royalty too, how cool is that?!?!

In any case, every one of you folks that dropped by is tops in my book… from the wonderful Weakley County Duo to the fabulously fun Sista, wise and wonderful John H, kilowatthour who’s always such fun and a cheer-up, infectiously optimistic good man Smiley, Ivy the great and wonderful and kickass, super sweetheart KathyT, and the absolutely inspiring AT even tho he despises Blogger (heh), the fab Bez (my comrade in GuruNess!), and happy and also optimistic Jeffraham who is always so cheerful, as well as Shauna who was monitoring the whole disaster from NIT this weekend… I hope I didn’t leave anyone out but it was all so very much appreciated. You guys are all awesome and getting to be like family I didn’t know I was missing and that’s so cool, and I’m so looking forward to meeting everyone in person soon in Middle TN, and hopefully AT before long, and kilowatthour, who’s been thinkin’ she should gather up a blogger meet in Tennessee and I say come on down after the holidays, heck yeah! OK, stopping before I gush anymore, but I am very touched, thanks, and y’all are good folks. (PS Jeffraham, hit me up if Bez can’t get you with the Gurustuff, I got tons.)

Overheard in New York also did a bit to cheer me up last night and got me cracked me up a bit too so that was a cheerer-upper. People are funny/strange, for sure.

Today’s probably gonna suck too, but hopefully not quite as overwhelming and anxiety-inducing (at least I hope not)… if things don’t go well it’ll probably be the bitchfest from hell later. I was kinda annoyed yesterday because I had a post nearly finished before all this happened about how the city of Mempho is turning into a police state, but not only will I just save it for later - if my car got towed to the city impound lot, no doubt I’m going to have even more to say about that subject! Will update later on how things go… fingers crossed the car’s still there, that will just be such a hassle…

PostSecret updated. Whew.

My mom mentioned my Creomulsion post from the other day. And said not one word about the fact I admitted I used to sneak around and eat baby aspirin like Sweet Tarts.

It’s almost 2 a.m. on Sunday and PostSecret hasn’t updated yet. PostSecret DTs are imminent… ack!

I wish I had a dollar for every time I have told an animal of the feline persuasion “Move” or “Go away” in the past 24 hours.

Wow, I didn’t really see this coming, but I am already experiencing a disturbing side effect of NaBloPoMo. Thanks to all these other folks that are participating in NaBloPoMo in the month of November, I’m collecting MORE blogs to read! Ack! Something I needed like a great big new hole in my head.

I spend way too much time every day reading folks’ blogs as it is, which I have lately been justifying by the fact that I recently cut off my cable (wasn’t using it anyway, and that all’s another blog entry for another time). A lot of my freelance work that should take an hour or two a night winds up taking untold hours (especially if the work was boring to begin with) ‘cos I’ll keep taking little breaks and go surfing around to see what’s happenin’. So damn all those folks in my links list… you’re all too interesting!

I kid, of course. But I have found some really great blogs! I tend to lean towards the slightly twisted humor side of things anyhow, and I have found some places of late that are just a total hoot, including There is No Vodka in this Kool-Aid! (on my better and funniest days I can’t even hope to be half this hilarious), Sarah Says…, The New Jan Brady, Dirty Catholic, Citizen of the Month, and several more new ones I’ve picked up and started reading in recent days. These are all very funny folks! And then I’m finding other blogs that make me laugh indirectly thru these I’m finding via NaBloPoMo. It’s getting crazy with the blogging here!

I’m gonna OD on blogreading before it’s all over with but that’s OK, all the snickering and giggling and spitting coffee on my brand new keyboard will be worth it. Well, on second thought, maybe I need to throw a towel over the new keyboard when I make my blog rounds. It is brand new and was a bit expensive, after all.

It’s just gonna get worse tho, ‘cos I’m anxiously awaiting the final updated list of NaBloPoMo participants - because I’m anal like that, I don’t wanna undertake this next task until it’s complete - and then I’m gonna go thru every single one and see which ones tickle me pink and trip my trigger. And then, no doubt, I’m gonna have to reorganize my links somehow some way ‘cos I’m anal like that too. Oh, my.

Well, you know what they used to say - Reading is Fundamental**! (Oops, showing my age there… eek.)

**(PS - Oh, apparently they STILL say Reading is Fundamental… oops. Was just having ’70s TV commercial flashbacks for a moment there…)

I gotta motor for the rest of the weekend… places to go, people to see. I’ll be back here Monday. Or at least by Wednesday, because that’s November 1st, and because Mrs. Kennedy told me I had to.

Things you can do while I’m gone:

See what new secrets go up on PostSecret on Sunday.

Pretend to be a dead rock star.

Watch a creepy little movie called Play With Me (click the interactive version).

Watch a classic film.

Cats!

(Non-music junkies may move along…)

Thanks and undying gratitude to dearest, sweetest, most adorable darling little Matt Tomich way over on the other side of the world… I am sooooooooooooo relieved that The Skyway is back online finally.

A Lynnster Zone (any version!) without the all-time longest-running and best Internet repository of Replacements sh*t in the links is like a…something terrible, lonely, and barren.

Happy dance ensueth…

I’m sashaying my way to making three deadlines this week and tomorrow morning’s is especially harrowing, so since time is at a bit of a premium today, allow me to introduce you to comedy duo Travis and Jonathan, who are a riot and mostly very much NSFW.

I actually know Travis - or rather, some of his good friends and acquaintances were some of my good friends and acquaintances way back when, when I was in and out of college in Murfreesboro. I have had an oft-watched and well-loved VHS copy all these years, via one of those mutual friends, of one of Travis’ early pieces of comedy genius, filmed while he was still in high school or just out. I figured he would grow up to be a comedian or an actor, or a director or producer or something, so I got a big giggle when I ran across him online earlier this year and discovered The Travis and Jonathan Show.

I kind of thought Travis was a jerk when we were introduced in 1987. I already knew who he was because of the aforementioned early film classic and through our many mutual friends, so I was kind of delighted to finally meet the legendary Travis L. Harmon. He was sitting in a darkened room in front of the TV, staring at the screen and looking slightly deranged and vaguely serial killerish. And when we were introduced, he just kinda grunted all caveman-like in my direction, so I pretty much went from delighted to unimpressed.

In retrospect, though, my boyfriend at the time (my ex, the seven-year freeloader) was a former friend of his, and they’d had a bit of a falling out over some other girl before I came along. And the boyfriend, I think, was with me. So the grunting, I guess, wasn’t entirely unexpected. Guilt by association. (Plus, we were probably all drunk at the time anyway. That’s usually how it was in the ’80s.)

But as it turns out - after a brief but pleasant conversation online earlier this year - my initial impression 20 years ago was a mishap, and Travis Harmon is a friendly and pleasant sort after all. Very nice, very friendly guy. And he and his partner, Jonathan Shockley, are hilarious together.

And Satchel looks eerily and exactly like an elderly male relative of mine, and sounds just like another one. Although probably everyone in the Volunteer State has a relative like Satchel. Dummies kinda freak me out anyway, even when they don’t look like my elderly relatives.

Anyway, take a (again, mostly NSFW!) break with Travis and Jonathan today and I’ll hopefully be back tomorrow with some other rant of no real consequence…

I am totally addicted to PostSecret, so much so that I will hit it as soon as I think of it after midnight on Sunday morning in hopes the weekly update is already up, and am pretty devastated when it’s not up yet.

So the fact that I didn’t think to look until just a minute ago - roundabout 2:00 a.m. CST Tuesday morning - well, that tells you (tells me anyway) my mind is elsewhere lately. (Also a reason for not blogging, but anyway… never let it be said I didn’t spare you guys the uncool stuff.)

Heck yeah, I’ve sent in a secret. Just one tho. I would tell you what it is, but that would kinda defeat the purpose, no?

Anyway, it hasn’t been published. Unless it’s in the second book coming out. Which I guess means I’m gonna have to buy the book. I haven’t bought the first book yet. I’m not THAT addicted. I can stop anytime I want to.

Wait - no, I can’t. I’m waiting for it to come out in paperback ‘cos I’m cheap like that.

But I’ll have you know I typed this post without reading this week’s update yet, tho. Even tho it’s in another window in my browser. Waiting. Oops, gotta go!

(P.S. Please know that that Wilco entry on today’s music playlist was a total accident. I would never, ever voluntarily listen to any of that stuff (with the exception of one single solitary Son Volt album and then for only a coupla songs). I am having issues with the Love and Ban buttons on my Last.fm player, I keep hitting the Love heart on the wrong tracks, and a couple of weeks ago I accidentally banned a band I love. Except now I can’t remember who it was ‘cos hey, they don’t come up in my Last.fm player anymore ‘cos I banned them. Um yeah, I need a new hobby.)

(P.P.S. Not to, like, offend any Wilco et al fans or anything, OK? All right. Now I REALLY gotta go, PostSecret awaits!)

For those of you reading on Blogger (because the link function on LiveJournal is really just kinda hopeless, tho I did update and change a few on the mirrored site there too) - I have not only cleaned up the Links section and rid it of some dead links, but have added a BUNCH more blogs, and some other interesting and/or humorous websites to the mix. See, I wasn’t just doing nothing other than spending entirely too much time on MySpace the last almost three months. In my extended absence, I collected a bunch more blogs to read (because I don’t have enough to read already every day, you know), and other stuff that amuses me. Plus a bunch more music/band links too.

If you peruse the collection of links down the just about whole right side of the page (again, on my Blogger page, not the LJ one), I swear to god you will almost assuredly find at least one blog or site that amuses you too, or that you find interesting. I, for one, happen to think Cats That Look Like Hitler is pretty hilarious and rad, myself.

Also, I just have to mention that Australia’s The Painkillers’ debut CD comes out in August. This two-piece (yes, two-piece!!!) band out of Perth consists of one Mr. Joe Bludge and the legendary James Baker, he being the original drummer for the Hoodoo Gurus back when I was a tee… um, well, in the early Eighties, OK? Anyway, it’s going to be very cool, and “Drunk on a Train” is by far one of my top very most favorite pieces of new music this year. Check ‘em out!!!

OK, so on to other things. Anyone who’s been reading here much at all over all the years knows I have a kinda bad habit of getting some song or songs stuck in my head that I’ll find myself humming or whistling for eons until it finally occurs to me what I’m doing/humming/whistling/whatever, and that’s it’s usually something really obscure or really goofy. A while back it was a double earworm - Foghat’s “Slow Ride” and “Rock and Roll Love Letter” by the Bay City Rollers at the same time. For weeks.

Well, this time I am slightly disturbed to report that the earworm of the last few weeks has turned out to be the Bunny Bread TV commercial jingle, circa the early Seventies. Which went, “That’s what I said - Bunny Bread”. You know, right? If you’re thirtysomething or fortysomething, that is, I guess.

Or maybe it was just a Nashville television thing? Does anyone who didn’t grow up watching Dan Miller and Bill Hall on Channel 4 remember that jingle?

In any case - gosh, I really need a new earworm. This one is just a little bit annoying. Well, actually kinda REALLY annoying. Eek.

I think probably because of Valentine’s Day recently, I was reminded of this acquaintance of mine - a fellow I have never personally met but have been acquainted with online for, gawd, probably 13 or 14 years I guess. Old-timers to the Zone have heard this tale of woe before, but there’s new folks showin’ up lately so y’all old folks can just deal.

If you’re very much younger than me you’ve probably never heard of them - heck, lots of people my age and thereabouts have never either - but this very pleasant Canadian fellow Rich and I have been part of an online sect of proud but few, rabid and slightly crazed (but, you know, in a good way) followers of Australian band the Hoodoo Gurus since, jeez, WAY back. They’ve been one of my all-time fave bands since the mid-’80s and - after years of never being able to get any news ‘n stuff on these shores - when the Internet was still small and started getting much more global, I came across a guy who was running a (then rather tiny) mailing list of fans and things just grew from there. The list has evolved and the numbers have waxed and waned over the years, but there’s still a core group of “charter members” as such around that have been yakkin’ and knowin’ each other’s business for getting on close to 15 years now online together, I think - maybe not quite that long, but it’s close. As the boon of the Internet kept making the online planet smaller and smaller, the band and their management have often been a part of that too and have always been extremely gracious and hospitable towards us, hosted a good number of us as VIPs at some international gatherings of the masses Down Under not just once but twice, and nearly all of the longtimers have either personally met or otherwise become acquainted with and/or worked with someone or someones in the Gurus or related camps at this point in time. Anyhow, I love me some Replacements and some Paul Westerberg, but I really really REALLY love me some Gurus. (And you’re all going “Who?” and now I feel ancient. Sigh.)

But to back up a bit and give a little history here, the band has been ceasing to exist and then reuniting again a number of times over the years. They first called it quits in 1998, regrouped again a few years later and did a tour; disbanded again, got back together again; disbanded again, got back together for a totally different project and then went back into the studio and cut a brand new Hoodoo Gurus CD a couple of years ago; and so on and so forth. You get the picture.

Where that brings me to is what I should have posted on or around Valentine’s Day - my tribute to Rich. For well over a decade now, poor Rich has been in the unfortunate position of the state of his love life being inexplicably tied to whether or not the Gurus have gone back into the studio, reforming to go on tour, etc. Things would be going swimmingly for Rich and whatever lady friend he was with at the time, and then - BAM! - the next thing you knew, you’d hear the band was in the studio again cutting a new album (or, in later years, reforming to go on tour again) and he’d be minus a girlfriend again. A fiancee even once, I think.

I can’t even begin to count how many times this phenomenon occurred since, oh, probably 1993, 1994? And I think even before then, as I seem to recall him telling us this weirdness had been occurring throughout the ’80s as well, before we all knew him. Many, many times… and every single time another relationship went to hell in a handbasket, it would turn out that something major was up with the band.

In more recent times… the summer of 2000, when the Olympics were about to begin in Sydney: “So my love life has gone to hell. I guess that means that the Gurus are reforming for the Olympics then. I’ll bet they had their first practice last week….musta been, because that’s when all the crap started. The link continues…”

And just last year, about a year ago and this time on the heels of some major releases & reissues by the band: “Well, just to let all you oldtimers here know that the synchronicity continues between Gurus’ activity and my trials and tribulations with the opposite sex! After a while of relative calm and sanity, things have gone awry spectacularly. And I realized that the DVD and CD reissues all seem to be coming out at the same time…the legend continues. *rolls eyes*“

All that said, over the last several years when it comes to that despicable holiday of February 14th (which I hate anyway), I usually make a point of thinking of and raising a glass to good old poor cursed Rich and hoping that, maybe one day, the curse will be over. Or at least maybe when the band finally stops reuniting and going on tour and putting out more major releases, he’ll finally get a break. Much as I’d hate to see that happen finally and forever, I really think I wo