You may have noticed that our annual Favourite Albums and Films of 2006 articles are now online. Go enjoy.

While doing the above, people complained that they couldn’t vote for stuff that didn’t come out this year or for gigs so I promised we would do it on the blog. We used to do this on ye olde diskant YahooGroup but that has really and truly died after EIGHT wonderful years of complete and utter timewasting. I’m sure the YahooGroups stormtroopers will miss us.

So, make up your own categories for the stuff you wanted to write about. I’m not doing ineligible albums of the year as I still intend to post my Songs of the Year thing.

MOST LISTENED TO BANDS (according to my iTunes)

Errors
Otterley
Findo Gask
Pet Shop Boys
Mogwai
Joanna Newsom
Burowelt
Girls Aloud
Gay Against You
Dananananaykroyd

It seems I am a walking advertisement for Glasgow.

GIGS

Lightning Bolt/Gay Against You @ Grand Ole Opry, Glasgow
Sonic Youth/Stooges @ ATP Minehead
Findo Gask @ The Arches, Glasgow
Ladytron @ Cross Central, London
Errors @ Stereo, Glasgow
Mogwai @ The Barras, Glasgow
Danananaykroyd/CSS @ Indian Summer, Glasgow

WEBSITES

Flickr – I live my life on Flickr. It’s my MySpace
Popjustice – Still hilarious and almost always right
Design*Sponge – has cost me an absolute fortune in buying cute things from design shops.
No Rock’n’Roll Fun – Makes most of the music press pointless
I Was Just Really Very Hungry – Intelligent and inspiring food writing
Wonderland – Computer gaming be fun!
Remember The Milk – has literally changed my life

FILM/DVD

NANA – Film of the Japanese manga
Everything is Illuminated – Amusing and then unbearably poignant
Bring It On – Cheerleading, cliches ahoy and Kirsten Dunst – what more do you want?
Hustle and Flow – Ridiculous
Whisper of the Heart – Finally on DVD with proper subtitles, my second favourite Ghibli because I am a sap

BOOKS

Harumi’s Japanese Home Cooking – my new bible
The Best of Smash Hits – All the best stuff from the classic 80s period
Garbage Land: On the Secret Trail of Trash – will make you horribly aware of every single thing you throw away
Paradise Kiss – My favourite manga for having a depressing undercurrent of realism underneath the fashion and relationships stuff, for being short and for not having a happy ending.
NANA – 2 girls called Nana, one a punk singer and one a cutesy ditz. Taking absolutely forever to get translated and getting darker by the week (if you sneakily watch the animes which are way ahead)
100 Posters, 134 Squirrels – Jay Ryan’s amazing posters. So good I bought a real one.

COMPUTER GAMES

Animal Crossing: Wild World (DS) – I am still playing this daily. I sent everyone in my town a “festive” tree and am currently trying to build perfect snowmen to get furniture (when dung beetles aren’t running off with my snowballs) while helping the Museum owl to get over his morbid fear of insects.

Cooking Mama (DS) – Learn to cook literally seven million Japanese dishes under the watchful and rather scary eyes of Mama. Making sushi and dumplings is hilarious fun – measuring rice and not dropping your steak on the floor less so.

Chibi-Robo (Gamecube) – Tiny robot runs around the house making everyone happy by cleaning and tidying and fixing problems. Why isn’t tidying the house this much fun in real life?

Tamagotchi Corner Shop (DS) – Just ridiculous. I really spent far too much time hanging out with a bunch of bunny-shaped things and puddings with eyes making them cakes, washing their clothes and decorating their teeth. Happy Tamagotchis thanking Stu for decorating their teeth with I HEART HITLER will live with me for a long time.

EVENT OF THE YEAR
ATP – Was good to be back and the new site made it doubly exciting, not to mention all the good bands, the company, the continental cheese, the chalet, the excellent television and that unique Butlins experience.

THINGS YOU DID MOST THIS YEAR
Eat Japanese food
Play with my DS
Put photos on Flickr
Make things
Read millions of blogs via RSS
Stand at bus stops
Wait for/on delayed trains
Order stuff off the internet

PLACES VISITED
Japan (Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara)
Oxford (three times!)
London (twice)
Brighton
Newcastle

LOOKING FORWARD TO IN 2007
Going back to Japan!
2006 being over

Posted: 12|29|06 at 12:32 pm. Filed under: end of year.
Comments and pings are currently closed.