Okay, so I’m a sucker for free shit.

Especially free CDs and DVDs.

This here is mine and PVDD’s DVD collection. Just in case you’re wondering, it’s about 450-500 DVDs. Pretty pathetic compared to our friend Colin who’s got thousands, and PVDD still has a ton more he wants to get. Plus I haven’t gotten nearly enough chick flicks yet…)

Our friends call it the video rental place. We loan out DVD’s all the time, and always get them back. Why? Because PVDD has a mind like a steel trap and at any given moment can tell you who has what movie and how long they’ve had it.

There’s a few we have that I can’t stand. PVDD has a very eclectic taste in movies, and there are some where I spend the majority of the movie staring at him in aghast, horror-stricken dismay. Probably just like how he looks at me when I want him to watch some sappy romantic comedy, most likely.

Anyway, I digress.

I like free stuff. So, of course, I signed up for the BMG CD thing, right? For years all my music was on my computer and I just made discs of mixed CDs. I think I have a mixed CD for every mood and occasion, and all labeled as such.

I decided, though, that I wanted the right versions of stuff, and to be able to, you know, make an immediate selection of what band and/or song to listen to, and so I decided I needed some CDs. Hence, the “fifteen free CDs just for signing up!”.

So for a while they’re just sending me whatever the CD of the month is, and I’m pretty much a happy little clam since I don’t have ANY and the ones they are sending (with the notable exception of Kenny Rogers and Top 10 Classic Country Hits) were actually ones I wanted and never thought about actually getting.

However, there’s always a point when a good thing becomes too much of a good thing, and one day I go and look at my account thinking that it’s time to cancel it, and lo and behold, I have thirty-two free CDs stocked up, all I gots to pay is shipping. Woot!

So I ordered sixteen and left sixteen for PVDD, and I got mine today. Incidentally, that was $44 to ship sixteen CDs, or basically less than four bucks a CD. Woot! Deals!

Now, I do with CD’s what I do with books – if I like the author or the band, I’ll buy the next one that comes out just so’s I can surprise myself. I like to stick with what I know is good, but yet branch out at the same time. Clever, huh! There’s nothing like popping in a brand new CD where you don’t know any of the songs on it and sitting on pins and needles till you hear it and can tell whether you like it or not. If you don’t…well, there’s always FYE and in-store credits.

So let’s have a look at my new hoard:

Soul Asylum – Black Gold: Dude, seriously! This was like, my A-#1 favorite CD in high school. Tell me you didn’t just croon along to Runaway Train and I will…well…I will sing it to myself for you.

Norah Jones – Come Away With Me and Feels Like Home: I had a copy of Come Away With Me, until I wore it out on my road trip to LA and back. All the best songs started skipping…so I free’d me up a new one. Feels Like Home, well, hopefully it’s as good.

Train – Drops of Jupiter, My Private Nation, and For Me It’s You: I don’t know one damn song on any of these albums yet (with the exception, of course, of the frist one – my copy of that was kiped from my desk at work, the insensitive bastards). Alive at Last is their live album, though, which should be neat. Here’s to surprises!

Three Doors Down – Away From The Sun, Seventeen Days, The Better Life: Here we see in action: I like some of their songs so I buy all their CDs. They’re quite prolific aren’t they?

The Garden State Soundtrack – Guys, if you haven’t seen this movie, it’s worth it for the soundtrack alone. And kinda for Zach Braff even though he’s kinda funny-looking.

Counting Crows – August And Everything After: I dunno. I love Mr. Jones and Round Here. I like the songs on their other album better though…not sure why I didn’t get that.

The Wallflowers (kiss my ass, 3D) – Breach and Bringing Down the Horse: Bringing Down the Horse was my favorite TAPE, dudes. My frist car only had a tape deck (though it did have a great speaker system…why the hell didn’t I have them put in a CD player instead? Silly cow.) I got Breach just in hopes that it’s as good as the other.

The Pretenders – The Pretenders: I got this completely and solely because I want to learn how to sing Brass In Pocket. I listened to it already, and I can groove to it, it’s not bad.

Matchbox Twenty – More Than You Think You Are, Mad Season: Because I lovelovelove Rob Thomas and because, well, you guessed it, I loved their first one.

Notice: NO COUNTRY. I get one of those a month and I just went and bought like eight the other day. So there.