Nora and MJB

Before blogging any futher, I want to give a shout-out to Nora, who has truly been a blogging inspiration. Believe it or not, she was the only person I'd ever heard of who had a blog, with the exception of various right-wing nutsos, lunatics and wingnuts. (Just kidding, family members). Anyway, I didn't know real people did blogs until recently. Then I learned that Nora, who lives with, er . . . dates my brother-in-law, in New York, where they may or may not live together (how would I know, Nora's grandma? And how did you get my phone number, anyway?) is a blogger.

One thing I like about Nora's very entertaining blog is that, every time she posts, she has this thing where she lists what she's currently reading and listening to, which is fun because, c'mon, when it comes to music in particular, who doesn't like to make fun of other people's tastes? No, seriously, who really doesn't? Okay, fine, really super-seriously, who doesn't like to find out what kind of music other people are listening to (or is it just me?). At least when I was younger, that's how I discovered a lot of great music. And even nowadays, would I be such a devotee of Juelz Santana or Trick Daddy, if not for 15 subjecting me to hard-core rap music at ear-splitting volume while I drove him to basketball practice? I think not.

So, since Nora does it, I'll just do it, too. Okay, are you guys ready? All right, here I go. I'm just gonna put myself out there . . . right . . . now. I'm currently listening to Mary J. Blige's new cd, "The Breakthrough."\ Repeatedly. And I like it a lot. How about that? Most appealingly, it has a great new version of U2's classic "One," on which she duets with Bono. So, anyway, you heard that right, I'm listening to Mary J. Blige's new cd right now. There's a comment section here. You know how to use it. So bring it on.