Tuesday Top Ten: GMYH Ten-Year Anniversary Edition

Thursday marks the tenth anniversary of GMYH.  Yes, that's right, this here blog has been around for ten years.  It all started because a man they call Wee Wee told me I should start a blog.  So I did.  What started with a post about my then-young dog shitting blood has morphed into so much more, depending on whether you consider a blog with an undying devotion to The OC, hair band music, IU, and old-school videos "so much more" than your run-of-the-mill canine anal bleeding blog.

I sincerely thank each and every one of you for reading GMYH over the past ten years.  I enjoy writing, even if I don't get the chance to do it as often as I did in the early years.  As it turns out, children are a tremendous time-suck.  But rest assured, my goal is still to get you to laugh, whether at me or with me, or at least to force you to read my opinions about music.

With that, here are a few Top Ten lists for you to peruse, since I assume you have nothing else to do on Tuesdays.

Ten GMYH Milestones

Here are ten GMYH milestones, other than my first post, of course.

1.  September 16, 2005:  The first Hair Band Friday

2.  May 18, 2006:  The first Midwestern Eavesdropping (although technically, it started nine days earlier with "Eavesdropping in Chicago")

3.  February 22, 2007:  The last episode of The OC.  I miss it.  Every god damned day.

4.  May 10, 2007 to August 7, 2007:  I listened to all of my CDs, A-Z, and told you all about it.

5.  September 2, 2008:  The first Tuesday Top Ten

6.  October 1, 2009:  The birth of Rocktober

7.  December 2009:  The birth of Daughter

8.  September 2011:  The birth of Lollipop

9.  November 30, 2011:  The first Retro Video of the Week

10.  March 2014:  The birth of Son.  Note that because he is a third child, the announcement of his birth was delayed for two months.

Ten Most-Visited Posts

I attempted to keep track of page hits, but the tracker reset or stopped working a few times, so the number you see on the right sidebar is not accurate.  In June 2010, Blogger began keeping track of page hits, and it says I have had over 299,000 hits since then (which makes me believe the approximately 311,000 on the counter on the sidebar that is supposed to estimate the total visitors since the beginning is not accurate, since I had over 100,000 visitors by mid 2009).  The nice part is that Blogger also keeps track of how many hits each post gets.  According to Blogger, as of today, here are the ten most-visited posts on GMYH (since June 2010, obviously), with the date of the post and the number of hits in parentheses.

10.  Tuesday Top Ten:  Halloween Costumes (2012 Edition) (November 1, 2012; 1,837 hits)

9.  Song Dissection:  "Promises" by Eric Clapton" (April 3, 2011; 1,967 hits)

8.  Tuesday Top Ten:  Halloween Costumes (November 3, 2009; 2,190 hits)

7.  1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (September 9, 2009; 2,374 hits)

6.  Tuesday Top Ten:  Reasons IU is Better Than Purdue (November 17, 2009; 2,566 hits)

5.  Tuesday Top Ten:  Halloween Costumes (2010 Edition) (November 2, 2010; 3,343 hits)

4.  Tuesday Top Ten:  Karaoke Songs For Guys (November 11, 2008; 3,391 hits)

3.  I Hate Purdue (November 15, 2007; 4,904 hits)

2.  Mr. 6000 – Adam McClure (January 7, 2006; 5,970 hits)

1.  Tuesday Top Ten:  Songs with "Sex" in the Title (February 15, 2011; 13,612 hits)

My Ten Favorite Posts

I would be remiss if I didn't present you with my ten favorite posts.  Granted, trying to narrow over 2,800 posts down to ten is not easy, and I'm sure I missed some that I forgot, but here are my ten favorite posts that I remember, in chronological order.  Most of them are from the first few years of GMYH, since I had more time on my hands then to recap my weekend escapades.

1.  Interview Tips and Tips for Interviewees (October 25, 2005 and January 25, 2006)

Ahh, the joys of interviewing other people.

2.  Areolas and Such (November 7, 2005)

It will be tough for me to ever top this one.  Just an unbelievably funny pattern of events that led to two consenting adults repeatedly having sex on the floor of a hotel suite, mere feet from many other adults who did not consent to having to hear two consenting adults repeatedly having sex on the floor of a hotel suite.

3.  Saved By The Bell Fans, Revolt! and Hot Sense of Humor (July 15 and 18, 2006)

Remember that time I mercilessly mocked a Christian rock band named Hot Sundae because they weren't the group of the same name from Saved By The Bell, and then the lead singer emailed me and took it really well?  No?  Well, read the above-linked posts.

4.  Golden Showers of Awesomeness (October 30, 2006)

On my 29th birthday, I transformed into Ace Frehley.  Ace Frehley had one hell of a time that night.

5.  I Hate Purdue (November 15, 2007)

If you Google "fuck purdue" –- which you should do at least twice daily, and six times a day during Bucket week -- this post is one of the first results.  That makes me happy.

6.  The first night of the first Oktoberfest trip (October 15, 2007)

Anytime someone on a trip to Germany with you sleeps on a park bench and helps deliver newspapers because he got locked out of his hotel is memorable.

7.  Things To Do In Chicago When You're Dead (March 3, 2008)

It wasn't a particularly hilarious post or anything, but it sticks out because of the fact that I and another married male friend ended up at some chick's apartment at 5 in the morning without any nefarious intent, and then proceeded to talk shit about Dennis Connor.

8.  Fuck The City of Chicago Department of Revenue (June 6, 2008)

If I've taught you anything, it should be that you should always challenge parking tickets in person, not by mail.

9.  The second day and night of the second Oktoberfest trip (December 10, 2010)

There was a lot of beer, a lot of blood, and a couple Kardashians.

10.  That time Paul Stanley took my picture at a Kiss concert in Vegas (November 18, 2014)

Possibly the single greatest concert experience I have ever had.

And what about you, fair reader?  What is your favorite GMYH post?