Categories: People

My Top Ten Guilty Pleasures

There are many things in life that make me happy: writing, singing, playing guitar, and reading, to name a few. However, some of the things that make me happy are a little embarrassing, so I consider them to be guilty pleasures. Most people don’t understand why I like the following things, but I love them anyway.

1. Clay Aiken: This is the guilty pleasure that causes most people to make fun of me, but I can’t deny that I have an unnatural attachment to Clay Aiken. I voted for him every week when he was on American Idol and even taped his appearances, so I could watch them again. I was so intent on Clay winning that on the night of the last episode where viewers were able to vote, I remember going to my favorite bar, sitting in the dark, frantically text messaging votes in for Clay! A few months later, Clay had a concert in Charleston; I paid $60 for a ticket (it’s not as bad as it sounds; $14 of that was Ticketmaster charges) and ended up with a seat a few rows from the stage; I probably shouldn’t admit this, but I screamed like a ten-year-old girl when he came out on stage and sang along with every word…and I’d do it again if I had the chance!

2. Joey: I only know one other person who likes this show, and I don’t really understand why everyone hated it so much. Of course it wasn’t as good as Friends-few shows are-but it was still funnier than most of the sitcoms that have been on TV the past few years. I was seriously disappointed that Joey didn’t get to finish its second season-at that point, Arrested Development had already been cancelled, so Joey was one of the four best comedies on network television (right behind Scrubs, The Office, and My Name is Earl). I got the first season on DVD for my birthday and watched it in two or three days; I can’t wait until the second season is released, so I can watch the unaired episodes!

3. 80s One-Hit Wonders: When it comes to listening to music on the radio, I’m never more excited than when a great ’80s song comes on…especially if it’s from a band that is only known for one song! There have always been one-hit wonders, but this trend seemed to be particularly rampant in the ’80s. The ’80s gave us great hits, such as “Safety Dance” (Men Without Hats), “Come on Eileen” (Dexy’s Midnight Runners), “Whip It” (Devo), “Turning Japanese” (The Vapors), “Mickey” (Toni Basil), “She Blinded Me With Science” (Thomas Dolby), and “Tainted Love” (Soft Cell)…the supply of one-hit wonders from the ’80s is endless, and most of these hits are still fun to listen to in 2007!

4. The Music of William Shatner: I’m not in love with Shatner’s first album, The Transformed Man (though I do really like his cover of The Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds”), but his latest album, Has Been, is absolutely wonderful and is one of my favorite CDs. Written with Ben Folds, the CD has its funny moments, but it also focuses on themes of sadness, regret, and fear. Anyone who thinks that Shatner’s musical abilities are something to be ridiculed needs to listen to Has Been-they will change their minds!

5. Pee-wee’s Playhouse: Pee-wee’s Playhouse was one of my favorite shows as a child, and I was thrilled when the entire series was released on DVD a few years ago. I watched every episode and realized that I still loved the show as much as I did during in my childhood. Paul Reubens is supposedly resurrecting Pee-wee and the rest of the Playhouse gang for an upcoming movie, and I will definitely be seeing that movie the day it hits theaters. If it’s even half as good as Pee-wee’s Big Adventure, it’ll be well worth watching!

6. Cute Overload: I could honestly spend hours on this website (and I have)! Cute Overload is a website that showcases pictures of adorable animals, and it is utterly addictive! The first time I went to this website, I spent over an hour looking at the pictures, and now I visit it a few times a day to make sure I don’t miss anything! If you like cute animals (and really, who doesn’t?), you should really check this website out!

7. Dr. Mario: This Nintendo game has a pretty nerdy concept (as Dr. Mario, you must kill viruses with pills), but it has been my favorite game for as long as I can remember. Even though I’m old enough that I should have better things to do with my time, I love Dr. Mario so much that I’ve gone through phases were I had to play it every day, always playing until I reached 100,000 points, no matter how long it took (but I’m really good at it, so it usually didn’t take too long). Even dorkier: whenever I play Dr. Mario, I put in a Broadway soundtrack and sing show tunes while I’m killing viruses!

8. Hobgoblins: This may be one of the worst movies ever made, but it’s pretty entertaining. I first saw this movie on Mystery Science Theatre 3000, but I’ll admit that I’ve watched Hobgoblins without the commentary of Mike, Crow, and Tom Servo quite a few times. Full of bad acting, bad writing, and the worst special effects known to man, Hobgoblins is the most unintentionally hilarious movie I’ve ever seen! Especially notable are the scene where two of the main characters fight with garden tools (and their girlfriends are way too involved in the outcome of the fight when really they should just be embarrassed that it’s happening at all) and the scene where a hobgoblin attacks one of the girls…it is very obvious that someone offstage threw a stuffed animal at the actress and she’s holding it to her neck and rolling around on the ground with it in order to make it look like she’s being attacked!

9. Movies based on Saturday Night Live sketches: I’m not a fan of all Saturday Night Live movies (and I won’t include Wayne’s World here since people generally like that movie), but A Night at the Roxbury and Superstar are two of my favorite movies. I think both of these movies are really funny; I have seen A Night at the Roxbury so many times that I practically have it memorized, and even though I never really enjoyed the Mary Katherine Gallagher sketches on SNL, I could watch Superstar over and over again. Maybe it’s just because I’m such a big Will Ferrell fan, but I really love these movies!

10. Sudoku: I held off on the Sudoku craze as long as I could, I even made fun of my dad for doing so many of the puzzles, but I came across one in a magazine and decided to try it. I was immediately hooked and went out the next day and bought a whole book of the puzzles. In the beginning, I was so into Sudoku that I had to do at least three of the puzzles every day! Unfortunately, I have carpal tunnel syndrome in my right wrist, and for the past few months, I have been unable to write with that hand, meaning no Sudoku. However, I recently discovered a website with free Sudoku puzzles, so now I can end my Sudoku withdrawals and do as many of the puzzles as I want!