Did I ever tell you I used to be a music snob?

I did, in high school. Once I befriended Jess and saw that we had very similar taste in music, but hers was cooler, because, um, there was no 'N Sync. I still stuck by the Spice Girls, though, but that was a huge secret. There may have been some other embarrassing secrets, but I'm not sharing them right now. Anyway, so I was all cool, listening only to bands that high school kids enjoyed (ahem, Dispatch) and totally deriding, like, Britney Spears and whatever.

Then I graduated from high school, and I started passively watching American Idol, even though the music snob did! not! approve! And then I fell in love with Kelly Clarkson, and I was pretty much, like, music snob be damned! I love this woman! And the Kelly Clarkson love opened the floodgates, so now I have Christina Aguilera songs and Britney Spears songs and Mandy Moore's greatest hits and still the Spice Girls albums. And I do not mean to say that Kelly Clarkson is on level with these bitches, because she! is! not! but deciding to love her even though I might get made fun of for it let me love other things I would probably get made fun of for. Do you see?

Anyway, despite that I am no longer a music snob (I own all of Jewel's albums, except that one dance/pop one, people), sometimes I flash back to the year 2000 when I thought I was cool. Oh yes. These times are like now, when someone with terrible taste hi-jacks the stereo in our department, and I have to listen to country music. I can't stand country music! Unless it's good! And I'm very picky, because most country music is baaaaaaad. But I think I like the Dixie Chicks--at least I totally love "Goodbye, Earl." I loathe the blonde bimbos of country, like Faith Hill and Carrie Underwood. That one Shania Twain song is fun to sing at BBW, "That Don't Impress Me Much" or whatever, but that's it. Dolly Parton is certainly talented, but her voice skeeves me. Carlos loves Reba, but I don't see it. Jen was in love with Kenny Chesney and that Australian guy--Keith Urban--and I was having none of it. I like Johnny Cash, sometimes. I hate Rascal Flatts. And, really, country music has forever been soiled for me by Toby Keith, that big redneck good ol' boy bigot.

But that's not to say I hate the music part of country. I bought the Brokeback Mountain soundtrack, and that's all country songs, and I love them. But...on the whole, country music is terrible.