Cuteboy update

Magnet #1144 - Thorsten Kaye at ABC's SuperSoapWeekend

Earlier this week my sister told me she can't tell anymore when the cuteboys I talk about are real, or not real - people I know in real life, or just on television.

Enter this magnet.

I can't believe I haven't used this one before. It's Thorsten Kaye at SuperSoapWeekend in Florida several years ago. The picture's fairly old - I mean, the man's not even on All My Children anymore, but shoot, a cuteboy is a cuteboy is a hot Thorsten - and I had this magnet made because it's one of my all-time favorite shots of him.

It's been a while since I've done a fluff magnetpost on cuteboys - I found this old 2008 cuteboy post that outlined all my favorite cuteboys of the time.

Looking back, half the shows aren't even on television anymore, but it cracks me up that my old cuteboy crushes have just been handily replaced by new ones...

Oh, well, I guess crushes by their very nature are fleeting. By network...shall we?

ABC

• Castle - Hello, @nathanfillion, and the rest of the boys of the cast.
• Brothers & Sisters - Hell, all of the Walker brothers.
• Private Practice - Taye Diggs, because he can do no wrong.

CBS

• Hawaii Five-0 - Alex O'Loughlin, Scotty Caan, and @danieldaekim? Yes.
• Blue Bloods - Tom Selleck, Donnie Wahlberg, Will Estes, I'll take 'em.
• The Good Wife - Josh Charles and yes, Alan Cumming.
• NCISes - Though I'm totes innocent, wouldn't mind if any of them came to question me.
• Flashpoint - The. Whole. Team.

NBC

• Chuck - @ZacharyLevi. And Jayne - I mean, Adam Baldwin.
• Friday Night Lights - Coach Kyle. Always, Coach Kyle.
• Parenthood - Peter Krause and can't believe I have a crush on him, @daxsheppard1.

FOX

• Fringe - Joshua Jackson.
• The Chicago Code - Jason Clarke and Matt Lauria. And shoot, add Delroy Lindo to that.
  
• Bones - @David_Boreanaz, and that @TJThyne guy.
• Lie to Me - Oddly enough, @TimRothLietoMe. But also the lovely @brendan_hines

The CW

• One Tree Hill - Nathan. And his new BFF, the dude from Lipstick Jungle.
• Supernatural - Both Winchester boys, and I'll raise you a Castiel.

USA

• Psych - c'mon. Shawn and Gus? Yes.
• Burn Notice - Michael. And of course, Sam Axe. Hello.
• White Collar - Matt Bomer. And oddly, the dude who plays Peter.
  
• In Plain Sight - Marshal Marshall - oddball, but then who doesn't love that.
  
• Royal Pains - Both brothers.
  

AMC

• Mad Men - Jon Hamm and John Slattery, even though we won't see them back until 2012. Oiy.

FX

• Sons of Anarchy - Jax Teller, cuz with each passing season, even with his hair and beard choices, he's still just awesome.
  

A&E

• The Glades - Matt Passmore is the only one in the world who can get me to watch any eps of McLeod's Daughters.
  

Lifetime

• Army Wives - Seriously just love all the husbands.

Yes, I just did a whole magnetpost on the cuteboys I watch on TV. Did I leave anyone out?

And yeah. It might be true that the show has to have a resident cuteboy for me to be invested. I dunno what that says about me.

Clearly, given my back and forth between RL names and character names, the line between RL cuteboys and TV cuteboys a little blurry...but, really, you'd know it if I were referencing any of these cuteboys in relation to my real life, thanks.

When sharks attack

Magnet #484 - Long Beach Island

Shhhhhhaaaaaarrrrrrk!!!!!

Hahaaaha - actually, a friend of mine gave this one to me - I've never actually been to Long Beach Island. Truth be told, I thought the magnet was actually from Long Island, until I took this picture, and had to look up where Long Beach Island was. (It's in Jersey.)

Have ya'll seen those super, super, super, silly, silly, silly Shark Attack movies? Where something's off about a shark (or two) off the coast of [insert country here], and [insert hot guy scientist here] has to find out what's going on and eliminate the threat - parts one, two and three. Three even has a Megalodon! Hahaa.

You might ask why I've ever bothered to watch. (You might actually ask why anyone bothered to make not one sequel, but two.) I never watched Shark Attack with Casper van Dien, even though he was hot. But I own Shark Attack 2, because it has Thorsten Kaye, the superduper hot guy from All My Children. And of course, I had to Netflix the third, Shark Attack 3: Megalodon, has superhot John Barrowman, who all but admitted that he did the movie for the money.

Hahahaa, it's truly amazing what I'll watch - and own - all for the love of a hot guy.

This magnet's kinda scary, though - lookatit's teeth! Grrrrr. Hmmm, I wonder if sharks actually growl.

Together, we're gonna find our way*

Magnet #366 - Stripes of Togetherness

They say that one blog is born every half second. Ok. I made that up.

They also say that most bloggers abandon their blogs within the first couple months of creating it. That I did not make up.

A year ago, I wasn't really sure if I'd stick it out - I mean, the other blog we started died on the vine, much like the trip itself. But joy magnetism still plugs away, mainly because my magnets are multiplying like rabbits.

But it's not been a year without growth. /pun intended

Below is a rather waxing poetical shortlist of what I've learned about the blogosphere and you guys.

- Search. I LOVE stalking my SiteMeter. I find it absolutely fascinating, the things people search online. I LOVE that I can see what people have searched to reach me. I swear, if I could rank all the searches that get you to this blog, "French word for gold" would totally be number 1. It's amazing the number of people in this world who want to know what is the French word for gold. And why, I wonder?

Oh! And good grief, there are lots of people looking for shirtless pics of people (Owain Yeoman, Russell Wong, Brendan Fraser) and end up here. Oddly, no one's searched for shirtless David Tennant.

- Global. I LOVE that the World Wide Web really is worldwide. Hi Beijing! Hi Scotland! Hi San Diego! Hi Norway! Seriously. I love that someone a world a way spent time on joy magnetism. Even better? I love that sometimes, I can link to my own page - literally, in Greek! It's so cool!

Flickfilosopher did this post last week where she showed her own SiteMeter map. Mine's nowhere near as crowded as hers, but I live for those weeks where every continent is represented! Well, ok, save for Antarctica. I am still waiting for someone in Antarctica to visit me. I realize they might be busy, but come on. Throw a girl a subzero bone, will you?

- Linking. I love it. If I could just surf the Internet to provide you with places to go for more information, and have that be my job, that'd be awesome. Yes. When I grow up, I want to be Google.

- HTML. I don't love it. I gotta tell you, it's fun to learn a new tip or trick, but sometimes, when I'm messing around with the html code for this page? You should see the havoc I've wrought. Heh. You're lucky the darn thing's in English and right side up.

- Marketing. Even though I'm really doing these magnetposts for my own fun, I figure if people don't see the pretty magnets, then what's the point. So I force myself to put this blog out there in the 'verse - on my FB status, on my FB wall, on a message board, or just forwarding to specific people that I think might find that day's magnet interesting. When I'm commenting on something fun on other blogs, my name's always hyperlinked back here; though I do try to avoid specifically linking to here in the comments of other blogs. Though, I will say that it's odd how much you start gauging your own traffic based on where you yourself have been.

- Traffic. I can't believe how much I love looking at the page view ticker at the bottom of joy magnetism, and checking out the first-time, unique and repeat visitor traffic. It's fun to see what topics get the most play (almost anything ComicCon or David Tennant and Doctor Who). And you can also start to guess who has Google alerts for which people - Thorsten Kaye or Joshua Jackson. And of course my George. Though, I get an odd tickle over seeing joy magnetism pop up in my own Thorsten Kaye, David Tennant or George Clooney Google Alert emails.

- Historical record. I love that everything I've written on joy magnetism is there for me to go back to. Blogger.com and photobucket.com, please never lose your servers or my content. Ever. But even more so, I love that I can go back and see how I felt about a particular something on a particular day. It's almost better than a diary. Though I'll admit, I stopped keeping a diary the day my grandmother read that I hated her in mine. I was 11, going on 91, with as much of a know-it-all I was then (and now, really). Anyway, moving on.

- Dialogue. Blogging is a two-way street. The best blogs are the ones where people comment and the blogger responds. It becomes a conversation. I love that. That's how you find out where peacocks come from, or that your commenter had a completely different take on something than you did. Nothing upsets me more than seeing a blog where the blogger writes a post, multiple people respond to it, and the blogger can't be bothered to talk back. Talk back to me, bloggers. If I want a one-way street, that's what I have Google for.

- Commenting. I am a commenting freak. It's addictive. I never used to. Now, especially if it's a blog I love or have on my Google Reader and follow religiously, I always feel like sharing. But really? Oftentimes, the funnier stuff happens in the comments. Mind you, my traffic isn't so crazy that you have to wade through dozens of repartee, but I've got some funny commenters here. Thanks, guys!

Well, it's been a fun year together, and a really fun learning process. I hope to keep trying to find my way in the blogosphere, and I can't wait to see how this next year plays out.

Happy magneting!

Lord. I just made up another word.

*From the theme song for Silver Spoons, which I will now be singing all the way down to Tampa today.

eta:
Thanks, Gordon, for today's and yesterday's magnets!

Have you seen Tom Collins?

Magnet #287 - Miller High Life's Girl in the Moon

So in 1933, the 21st Amendment was repealed, and today marks the day prohibition was officially lifted. And the next day, sales for headache powders went up.

My sister got this for me up in Milwaukee, WI, I believe after having taken the tour of the Miller Brewing Company. I gotta say that I don't think I've ever had a Miller High Life, but then, I'm not much of a beer-drinking gal.

I'm more of a hard likker chick, my drink of choice being the ever-so-outdated Tom Collins with a splash of cranberry. No, seriously. It's been my signature drink since my freshman year of college. No real reason why.

If the bartender knows his stuff, he knows that it's simply gin with soda water, lemon juice and sugar syrup, and then the splash of cran. If they look at me with a blank look, I know I'm in for long night of subpar drinking. In fact, that's always why I add the splash of cran, because it will generally mask how bad the bartender made the first drink. Which then gives me time to drink it, and then decide whether to switch drinks midstream.

There are a few really great places to get a Tom Collins in town - One Manhattan, down in the meat-packing district, or even upstairs on the rooftop bar, Plunge, at the Hotel Gansevoort around the corner. But, the last, best one that I had was at this bar, ironically called Prohibition on the Upper West Side.

It's the one that Thorsten Kaye from All My Children just loves to plug - and why wouldn't he, it's owned by one of his BFFs who happens to be married IRL to TK's onscreen love, Alicia Minshew. Of course, my cynical side is still trying to figure out if TK really does like their fish tacos there, or if he's just trying to get all the women from Tri-State area and beyond to come visit Pro, in hopes of seeing him at the bar. I'm not gonna lie, that gambit's worked, for me and several of my friends.

Speaking of gambits...so, until I started writing this post, I never knew the story behind Tom Collins. But here's funny, according to the wiki, apparently, back in the 1870s, someone would be in a bar, and ask people if they'd seen Tom Collins. At least one person would say umm, no, and the first person would rile him up saying "well, he was in here talking about you," and then that other person would get ticked off and go running after Tom Collins to beat him up.

Hahahaha - I'm sure that gag was much funnier in the 1870s. Nowadays, it's likely to start a bar fight. Hey, maybe that's what happened to Plaxico?

Always. Only Us. Part 2: And the not so Good.

Magnet #268 - Soapnetic

I picked up this holographic button, now magnet, from SSW. Soapnetic is SoapNet's online video outlet - kind of like NBC's deal with Hulu. And it would totally be a cool thing to watch, were it not totally and frustratingly not available through every ISP. Hmph.

I've mentioned a couple of times on joy magnetism about how I used to love Zach and Kendall from All My Children. Well, this guy's Cameron Mathison, the guy who plays Ryan Lavery, making my little lovable twosome into an annoying troika.

Without this becoming a long rant about how CamMat is the hardest working man in showbusiness with enough heat to launchpad on to something else, so why hasn't he gone off the show and done it yet is beyond me, I actually love the guy, I just wish Ryan would leave town for good already. If he could take the current AMC writers with him, that'd be superduperawesome.

And, that's all I have to say about that. Heh.

Always. Only Us. Part 1: The Good.

Magnet #267 - Thorsten Kaye at SuperSoap Weekend

For those of you who don't know, this weekend is SuperSoap Weekend down in Orlando. It's when ABC gathers up all of their soap talent and herds them down to FL to make a veritable mint off of all the soap fangurls in merchandising, park fees, lodging and food.

I've mentioned going to SSW a couple of years ago, and conning two of my friends to go with me. It's one of those friends that gave me this cute magnet.

The couple at the top is Alicia Minshew and Thorsten Kaye - who play Zach and Kendall (a.k.a. Zen, or Zendall) on All My Children. We love them. Or, we did, before the new powers that be at ABC started to screw about with them. Now, I don't even bother to FF through to hot TK's scenes.

So, that weekend, hanging out with my friends, plus a few more friends that we met down there, we had SO much fun! I have to say only the three of us could pack so much silliness and giggling into one weekend. From the moment my friend bumped into Blair from OLTL in the bathroom at LGA on our way down, to the moment where my other friend stalked hot boy Aiden Turner with her paparazzi camera, to the moment when I huffily ran into Nash from OLTL on the jetway at LGA after having landed. It was non-stop giggling.

Gravy, I don't think I've laughed so hard in my life. And, for the cavalcade of hotness, follow this link to the slideshow of the paparazzi shots my friend took.

Cheating on George Clooney...with Thorsten Kaye

Magnet #150 - Thorsten Kaye

Ok, ok, it's a miniseries, I can't help it. I think there's only one left after this one.

Yeah, George Clooney knows by now that I'll always come home to him, but my wandering eye, has forced me to wander to places and people that I would never have thought I'd go.

Case in point: Thorsten Kaye, from the ABC soap operas, All My Children, One Life to Live and Port Charles. And the film Shark Attack 2. (Yes, there was a second one. And a third, if you want to get technical. But that third one shouldn't count since John Barrowman swears he did that just for the money. Wait, you didn't know there was a first?)

So V thinks I'm a little nuts going to London to see David Tennant. Some might think I'm a little nuts because I already have my elevator conversation planned out for Josh Duhamel (it's to tell him that I've been to his hometown of Minot, North Dakota, but we thought it was pronounced Mineau...c'mon, he's sure to get a giggle out of that. Oh, shut it.)

But, to be honest, only Thorsten Kaye has lured me to actual soap fan events. I know! And not just one. Noooo, because that would be sane. I've now been to one AIDs fund-raiser, one pancreatic cancer fund-raiser, one studio taping event at ABC, and the piece de resistance, one SuperSoap Weekend at DisneyWorld. To be fair, I convinced friends to go to them too, so I'm not the only nutter in the bunch.

And, it's not like I want to meet the guy. Actually, it's not like I want to meet any of my boys. Oddly enough, I don't like knowing there's someone behind the tv or movie screen. I don't really want to know what these guys are like in real life, lest they let me down, and ya know, be human.

I guess it's a good thing that I haven't met any of them. You see, they serve alcohol at these fan events, which gives both the fans and the soap actors a chance to unwind and get stupid. Together. In the words of David Tennant driving around the Top Gear track - "That was baaaaddd!!!! That was baddddddd!"

So, Colin Egglesfield - you're definitely one guy that I'm not cheating with George on, but you were the last actor to pay for my fan event silliness. I'm sorry for drunkenly chastising you (read: yelling) for forcing your BFF from Chicago (read: the guy who works at a sister company of mine and technically a work colleague, since that's all we talked about - work) to come to the last charity bartending event and making him watch all the girls fawn over you (read: instead of him, cuz honestly, in a drunken haze, he was a bit cuter than you).

See? David Tennant was right. That was bad. Having a bit of a shouting match with a soap star is bad. Though, I suppose it could have been worse. I could have been a drunken cocktail waitress from Vegas who ended up going home with George Clooney.

No. Wait. Damn.