I’m not sure what this means besides grooming being a bigger priority than reading, but I do think John Edwards could’ve learned something from y’all: if he’d only concentrated on wearing underwear at all times instead of reading one too many steamy Harlequin American Political Romances, he might still be on Obama’s VP list.

This week I’m offering a $10 iTunes giftcard to the winner of Things That Must Go. I know ten bucks isn’t much, but I’ve already blown this week’s ad revenue on a Happy Meal for the kids. Plus, iTunes is cool, right? I only ask that you download Lenka’s The Show with part of your winnings. Just kidding. Leaving a comment with your Things That Must Go is the only thing you have to do. Well, really you only have to pay taxes and die. Or go to jail and die, or get signed up as a Conscientious Tax Objector and die. Leaving a comment is sounding better and better, huh?

But first, here’s the winner of the Nora Roberts/Joan Wickersham book giveaway (email me your address and which book you’d like!):

Scarehaircare: Skimpy bikinis. If you are stupid enough to wear them, I am not going to stop my daughter when she points and says loudly “Mom, look at that!” because she sees your bum before you can pull your bikini bottom back up after coming down the water slide. (The same thing goes for jeans that are too low to sit in properly.) I am all for allowing the children to say what we cannot, in all politeness, say.

And two Honorable Mentions, which were in no way influenced by nepotism:

Grampa: One other thing that has to go are popsicle bags that can’t be opened without a lethal weapon (knife, scissors). No clever use of fingernails, teeth, or brute stength can open them. They don’t even leak when the popsickle melts; the sticks float, and the “soup” tastes like Kool-Aid. Such bags have spread to candy bars, cookies, and crackers. Away with such unopenable bags. Yes.

Tom Johnson: -Dryers that sounds like German army tanks.
-Feelings of inadequacy for not keeping your kids 100% reverent during church.
-Leaving your real glasses in the car and instead wearing sunglasses all day and evening in the house, looking like a retard. Do I make fun of how you look in your clip-on sunglasses?
-People who think hacking someone’s site and bringing it down is funny.
-Loud, angry voices in any context — at home, church, in the car. (Well, if you’re driving alone it’s okay.)
-Floam. Sounds like a cool idea, until it’s time to clean it up.

And here are my Things That Must Go for this week:

1. To the Nice Man at the Gym: I know it seems strange that I’ve ventured into your territory of pulleys and benchpresses; I don’t like it any more than you do. But I hope we can learn to share this maze of equipment, which is why I’m asking you to please stop grunting. Please stop grunting. Please. I realize you’re lifting five thousand pounds and sweating and bursting at your muscle seams, but I cannot count to fifteen when you are grunting, grunting, grunting. What’s that? You didn’t catch that? You can’t hear anything, much less your own grunting, because you are listening to Coldplay on your iPod? Well, at least you have good taste in music. Just. Please stop grunting.

2. Fax machines. The Chinese gave us gunpowder and fireworks and smoggy Olympics. I’m sure we could pin the fax machine on them too. Seriously. Why can’t we just email and scan and email some more? Is it just me or are fax machines about as modern as a horse and buggy?

Now it’s your turn: what’s buggin’ this week? iTunes giveaway deadline is midnight Saturday.

Watching American Idol has brought us much closer as a family. And our musical know-how? Off the charts. But tonight Sally (7) and Susan (3 1/2) nearly came to blows. Sally says she’ll throw up if David Archuleta loses and if he wins, she’ll “scream so loud in the house” (it’s hard for me to tell which of those outcomes she thinks is better). Susan, getting a little tired towards the end, was livid. It was pretty heartbreaking to see our poor Cook falter a bit in critique.

Embarrassing as it is to have embraced American Idol so unreservedly, I have to say that music is what’s working for me lately. Dick and I didn’t have a song ten years ago. In fact, whenever we played newlywed-type games (not often, thank goodness), we made a point of proclaiming our songlessness. Suddenly, though, we are enjoying similar songs. Dick says my taste has improved, but I think it’s his that has improved, dramatically. He has always liked Bjork, after all.

Also singing my song are my iPod, iTunes and the new iLive docking station boombox I got for Mother’s Day from my favorite father-in-law (thanks Grampa!!). The only speakers in our house for years have been our wimpy computer speakers, and since I also love live radio, the iLive is awesome! I found it for $58 at Overstock.com (hope you didn’t pay more than that, Grampa).

The whole iOrganism could seem almost incestuous and repulsive if you didn’t consider that it’s Apple’s response to the evil Microsoft Empire. And frankly, once you invest in the iPod (or have a generous family member; thanks, Grampa! Again!) and iLive, the ability to buy one track at a time on iTunes is nothing short of nirvana. And for iTunes, gift cards can show up in your stocking; thanks Liz and Sean! Basically, the iWorld is an opportunity for people to give you stuff, again and again.

So, we’re downloading American Idol songs on iTunes (Carly Smithson’s I Drove All Night & Blackbird, Brooke White’s I Am, I Said, David Archuleta’s Imagine, David Cook’s All I Really Need is You, The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, Innocent & I’m Alive). From that list, it’s clear I should be texting like mad for David Cook. But Dick and I agreed to not vote. His votes and my votes would just cancel each other out, right?

As for our song? Lazy Eye was the first song I downloaded that Dick wanted for himself. We’re also playing the Estonian Kerli (who’s all international, eh?). Coldplay’s new Viva la Vida is awesome. But my favorite new artist is Ingrid Michaelson. Talk about an organic rise to fame. If you buy that whole thing about how she was just putting her stuff up on YouTube until the Grey’s Anatomy people discovered her. I love The Way I Am, Breakable, Die Alone, Far Away, and Starting Now.

Susan, who will do the motions to Once There was a Snowman, but will not sing the words to save her life, knows the chorus to Keep Breathing. And will sing it. I know, it’s an easy chorus. But still.

Susan’s Keep Breathing from jane on Vimeo.

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