2006: Stephen Colbert Rules

Hooray for the holidays! After a blogging break of over a week, I have returned from Rhode Island refreshed and rejuvenated, and I'm back in time to celebrate the year that was: 2006. Stephen Colbert gave a scathing and brilliant speech at the 2006 White House Correspondents' Association Dinner. It cemented my love for him and led to his inclusion on Time's list of the year's most influential people. Relive it or watch for the first time below!







By the way, I'm enjoying today's 16 Years in 16 Days countdown immensely. Guster! Death Cab For Cutie! MUSE! Happy Electra.

1995: The End of Calvin and Hobbes

As a young girl with a beloved stuffed animal, I couldn't get enough of Calvin and Hobbes. As an adult who still has said stuffed animal, I still miss Calvin and Hobbes. (It's a sheep, her name is Maryanne, and if/when I ever get married, she's coming on my honeymoon.) The final C&H strip ran on December 31st, 1995. Single tear. Here's a collection of 25 great Calvin and Hobbes strips to celebrate a great writer, a wonderful friendship, and 1995.

1994: Year of the Crow

1994-1996 are my favorite years of Q101 music. I look forward to these few days every year. 1994 brings back especially vivid memories: wearing out my August and Everything After CD, standing around the piano in the Park View Chorus room and singing while my best friend Nicky played Tori Amos songs, and discovering just how awesome Trent Reznor was - and continues to be.

Since Counting Crows, Sheryl Crow, and music from The Crow soundtrack all show up this year, I've lovingly referred to it as "The Year of the Crow." That led to a conversation with Scabs about Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Crow T. Robot. While the show didn't debut in '94, I definitely watched it on Comedy Central that year: it's probably one of the reasons for my lifelong love of mockery! (I thought Joel > Mike, though.) So, today's nostalgic memory is one man's collection of the top ten MST3K lines EVAH.

1993: Jordan vs. Bird

Q101.1's 16 Years in 16 Days kicked off earlier today. These countdowns are always a fun time of year. I'm going to try and dig up some pop culture nuggets over the next couple of weeks... and this one is for Sauce:

Cats Are teh Awesome

This is how my life feels lately:

...meaning that no matter how angry or empty I may feel, my gunslinger makes it better.


Also, Diesel Sweeties rules - if you like extremely weird webcomics about the romantic adventures between robots and humans.

Have a good weekend.

ATTENTION BEARS FANS!

The Bears play the Saints tonight. It's a rare Thursday night game for the Bears, so my good buddies Bellwether and the Awesome Sauce figure the occasion calls for a LIVE BLOG! It's been a while, but I have no doubt that we'll be able to pull off just the right combination of hard-hitting analysis and completely dorky pop culture references. JOIN US HERE! Game time is 7:15. If you don't have the NFL Network, you can see the game on My 50 Chicago. Word.

Edit: game is over, but the recap lives on!

Derrick Rose, Me, and Knives

So Bulls' rookie Derrick Rose has gone and inducted himself into the circle of "athletes who have injured themselves doing something stupid." In his own words:

It was a silly incident. I was cutting up some food, and I laid on a knife getting lazy in bed. I went to get a bottle of water, came back, forgot the knife was there, then sat down and sliced my arm.

Embarrassing, certainly, but I'd like Derrick to know he's not alone. As Sheriff Scabs lovingly pointed out this morning, I have a history with knives. In the past five years, I have:

1. Cut my finger while slicing a dinner roll at my boss's wedding (resulting in drinking way too much wine to ease my embarrassment and making a fool out of myself)
2. Cut my finger almost to the point of doing nerve damage while cutting an overripe avocado (resulting in six stitches and an inability to look at Pearl Jam's self-titled CD without wincing)
3. Cut my finger while washing dishes (Paul occasionally reminds me that I called to him from across the kitchen and said, "hey, how are you with blood?")
   

I'd rather have something sexier in common with the potential Rookie of the Year candidate - agility or a sweet lay-up, perhaps - but alas, knife-related scars it is. Anyone else want to join our club?

WHAT'S In Andy Samberg's Pants?

Move over, "D*** in a Box:" there's a new hilariously filthy Saturday Night Live skit in town. After catching this last night, I couldn't believe what I'd just seen - and I also couldn't stop laughing. Five minutes later, I actually burst out in involuntary giggles. It's adults only. I'm warning you.

Try getting THAT out of your head. Impressive cameos, too. Kudos, SNL. Enjoy the clip while it lasts...

GRAMMY Nomination Thoughts

The 2009 GRAMMY Nominations are out. Does anything about the following list strike you as odd?

BEST ROCK ALBUM
Coldplay, Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends
Kid Rock, Rock N Roll Jesus
Kings Of Leon, Only By The Night (love love love)
Metallica, Death Magnetic
Raconteurs, Consolers Of The Lonely

So let me get this straight. Coldplay (who have seven nominations in all, including one for Best POP Performance) and Metallica (two nominations total, the other being for Best METAL Performance) are competing against each other in the best ROCK album category. Color me boggled.

This category makes a bit more sense:

BEST ALTERNATIVE ALBUM
Beck, Modern Guilt
Death Cab For Cutie, Narrow Stairs (also: love love love)
Gnarls Barkley, The Odd Couple
My Morning Jacket, Evil Urges
Radiohead, In Rainbows (not my favorite Radiohead disc, but it's still Radiohead, and thus merits at least one "love")

A solid group, but I think that both the Raconteurs and Kings of Leon would have fit more comfortably in the alternative category. (One DJ's opinion: I'd kick out Beck and Gnarls Barkley.) I also think that it would be truly awesome if M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes" wins Record of the Year. That would more than make up for the perennial GRAMMY categorical confusion.

Note: I just did a little resarch. The CD on which you can find "Paper Planes," Kala, originally came out BEFORE the eligibility period (October 1, 2007 through September 30, 2008) and was re-released AFTER it ended. Curious. Maybe someone pushed really hard for "that song from the Pineapple Express commercials" to be eligible...