Guilty Pleasures

Let's talk about guilty pleasures, shall we? You know, the stuff you love that you should be scoffing at instead.

Here are my confessions:

• People Magazine. I have a degree in English. I even graduated with honors. I've read many of the classics, and have slogged my way through Faulkner with the best of them. As such, I should be embarrassed all to hell to read People. But, almost nothing makes me happier on a Friday night. If I can read it in a hot bath with a glass of Riesling (or a Diet Wild Cherry Pepsi) perched on the edge of the tub, so much the better.


• Bad Pop Music. One of my favorite hobbies is scoping out new music. I actually spend a fair amount of my time listening to music-related podcasts and reading music blogs. Few things thrill me as much as finding an inventive new song and adding it to my music library. 2009 found me grooving to Metric, the XX, Animal Collective, and Thao. Why, then, do I have "I Can't Wait" by Nu Shooz on my iPod? And "Der Kommissar" by After the Fire? Should I not be horribly ashamed? There are a handful of songs I cannot stop myself from liking. Do you remember the song "Dance with Me" by Orleans? I don't have that one on my iPod but if it comes on the radio, I am incapable of turning it off. Seriously. "Let it lift you off the grounnnnnnd . . . "
  


• Chocolate Chip Cookies (followed closely by the all-American brownie). My palate is vastly unsophisticated. I don't like cheesecake. I don't like flan. No to coconut, stuff with fruit jammed in it (I love fruit but I don't want it stuck in places it doesn't belong), and eclairs (stuff with goop inside it - blech). Nay, I prefer the same thing I preferred when I was five. Chocolate chip cookies. Brownies. No fancy ingredients, but oh. so. good.


• Talk shows. I've never been one for soap operas, but I do love to watch a good pithy topic played out on a talk show. I mostly stopped watching Oprah once she started blathering on about her "spirit" and other self-help topics. I watch Dr. Phil when he's got an interesting guest on. I want to start a drinking game where you have to down a shot every time Dr. Phil says, "This ain't my first rodeo." I've also been known to watch the occasional court show. I live to hear Judge Judy tell some slack-jawed defendant, "I'm smarter than you even on your BEST day."

There you have it - my lowbrow pursuits. What's your guilty pleasure? I was going to add "cheap wine" to the list but that might fall more appropriately under the category of "shameful vices."