you can't take the sky from me.

Andy and I have been watching this web series called Strip Search, which, guys, click that link -- it's awesome. It's basically a reality TV competition show, but the contestants on it are actually awesome, smart, creative, not-asshole human beings. It's run by the guys at Penny Arcade (even if you don't read the web comic, you should probably know them as the guys who spearheaded the PAX conventions -- and if you didn't know that, get over here, you little shit, I'm revoking your License to Nerd), and it's all about webcomic artists.

Reasons You Need to Watch This Show:

1. The people are awesome. Like, I seriously dare you to watch the show and pick a quick and easy favorite, or find someone who ellicits a deep and visceral loathing. I mean, there are definitely contestants I find funnier, or more talented, or more interesting, but usually on reality shows there's at least one person I know I'm rooting for, straight up, and at least one person who can GDIAF. But there's no one who's really a Jerkass, no one who's really even a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing (and we're up to the 5th elimination round, you'd figure they'd have emerged by now. Everyone is just really cool and hangs out.

2. These people have appreciable talent. And I know there are reality shows out there that have people with talents -- say what you want about it, but there are some genuinely good singers on American Idol (though the show went from Cheesy Guilty Pleasure to Shiiiiiiit over time), and there are other talent competitions that showcase actual talent. But for all of those, you have an equal number of reality shows about quasi-celebrities whose tenacious grasp on celebrity paradoxically hinges on the fact that they have a reality show. It's nice to see people who are good at something practice what they're good at. It just is.

3. If you have a creative bone in your body, OH MY GOD, this show is going to make you want to BE ON IT AND DO WHAT THEY ARE DOING, AHHHH. How much do I want to lock myself in a lakeview cottage right now with a dozen other creative people and just talk ahop and be given challenges and collaborative activities and shit?? SO FUCKING MUCH. I would legit plan out like, an un-broadcast version of this if enough of y'all wanted to participate and pitch in. Like, we'd develop challenges and chit, and do team and individual challenges (but we wouldn't have to kick people out, we'd just earn points and get rewards and stuff). It'd be fucking awesome.

4. Everyone looks like they're having fun! It's challenging, yeah, but no one ever looks like they're being exploited, humiliated, or feeling anything other than enjoyment and genuine gratitude for being there.

5. It's fucking hilarious.

6. EVERYONE IS SO FUCKING ADORABLE, OMG. THE CONTESTANTS ARE BASICALLY PUPPIES (ESPECIALLY KATIE AND MONICA).

I'm going to go dork around the internet while all y'all catch up on this show, and then we can chat about it, mmmkay?

Free Floating Hostility coming soon, because if I don't type it out, it will burn a hole in my soul.

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Oh God... this changes from time to time. I could probably think back and name dozens and dozens of websites on which I killed a good majority of my teen years, or which websites I spent all of my free time on between classes in college, or what websites kept me up far past any reasonable when I was in high school.

LiveJournal has, oddly, been the most consistent internet presence in my life, even when I didn't post for weeks at a time; with the exception of times during which I had zero 'Net access (which have been very few, and very far between), I have checked LJ everyday for almost eleven years. No other website even comes close. LJ is how my friends and I kept up with each other, where I made some new friends, where I found my penpals, where I discovered the writing challenge that is the basis of my book, where I found out about Muskrat Jamboree, where I discovered what fandom really was, where I discovered that I was not so weird, after all.

There are other sites I check everyday - Facebook. Twitter. Tumblr, which has become an addiction in its own right, and which caters to my "mindless fangirling and pretty pictures" cravings. I'm on AO3 a lot, though there are only three or four fandoms I check regularly. YouTube, quite often (hopefully more often, as I'd love to get into fanvidding again). Archives and sites for whatever fandom I'm into at the moment, so that changes quite frequently. I used to be on FanFiction.net a lot, but with so many other resources for fanfic, I venture over there only if I'm coming up short trying to find particular things else where (and with things like searchable kinkmemes and whatnot now, even that is becoming less of a neccessity).

I don't think any of those places has been quite as much of a time sink (and I use that phrase in a loving way, truly ;)) as LiveJournal. Thinking back, I do remember sinking hours of time on the official Queen site, way back when I was still in eigth grade, still on AOL, still paying by the hour, and still using a 14.4 modem. Oh God. And AOL, being the bastards that they were, would make signing off a hassle and a half - so long as you were paying by the hour. Oh, hell yes. If you were paying by the hour, you could click "Sign off" a dozen times without a damn thing happening. If you were paying the flat rate though, fuck, you'd get booted off if you tapped your keys too loudly. It was ridiculous.

Oh, I think the only place that could rival my time spent on LiveJournal would be Usenet, though of course this was ages ago - between ages thirteen and sixteen at the absolute most. Does anyone remember newsgroups? I frequented:
alt.music.queen
misc.writing (during my time there, I had my age and gender disected in a rather long thread regarding one of my poems)
alt.teens.poetry.and.stuff
alt.fan.lion-king (shut up, I was thirteen)
alt.fan.monty-python
rec.arts.disney.animation
alt.tv.frasier

And of course, there are certain sites I have spent hours perusing: most of the Cheezeburger network, for example; CuteOverload, Failblog, Snopes, The Straight Dope.

Does anyone else have some Internet nostalgia or current sites that you waste hours on?