Huh. That's rad as hell. Thanks for the knowledge!

As a diminutive for Margaret? If this isn't a reference, then I have no idea how that works.

It used to be about the pyro, man!

Marge, Margie, Meg, Maggie; I know I'm missing something.

So I did! Also left out Lisbeth, which is more of an alternate version than a diminutive.

Elizabeth is the name that keeps on giving. Liz, Eliza, Beth, Betty, and Betsy, all from one name.

That sounds like a much better trend (and similar to my Saturday, though it was a DVD and ragout).

Bluegrass purists are irritating as hell in their own way. Irish trad purists are generally OK; it's hard to be really into that music without a sense of humour.

Tea is the best. It's delicious and calming and energizing at the same time somehow. It's practically an antidepressant.

I thought there were 7. I'll have to look that up later.

Hmm. Good point. Sequencing is harder than it looks. You could almost get two good EPs, but one might seem a bit thin.

As someone who cooks almost everything in a pot, I come from your side, but I figure that everyone should be able to choose their gear. For some people, a separate grill is the smart option and more skillets would just be more clutter.

Hawkmoon and Desire to start, All I Want Is You and Van Dieman's Land to close.

I said it elsewhere, but an EP of just the originals from Rattle and Hum would have been remembered as a white-hot blast of beauty.

Probably Austra's Olympia for me. I think it's the only time I've ever pre-ordered an album. It's awesome and pretty much the most Austra thing ever Austra'd.

"Stay", "Lemon", "The First Time", "The Wanderer", "Babyface": pure bliss, all of them. It might be their quiet masterpiece.

Zooropa has long been swapping pride of place with Achtung Baby for me. Something about those records is both utterly of its time and timeless. Zooropa probably has the highest concentration of my favourite U2 songs out of any of their albums ("Stay" alone is important enough to me to justify any album). It was a…

Imagine if they had just released the originals as an EP. It wouldn't have been a huge event, but it would be remembered fondly as a surprisingly killer record. All of those songs hold up really well.

In hindsight, U2's creative ambitions were like a shark. They needed to keep moving forward or die. As soon as they decided that Pop was an embarrassment and they needed to get back to their roots, they were pretty much done as far as being influential goes.

You managed to hide an unfathomably terrible week behind two polite sentences. I want to make you an honorary Canadian somehow for that. My condolences on your loss.