Picture it: Thanksgiving of 2006 (yes, I’ve become Sophia in “Golden Girls”). I was living in Chapel Hill, NC, 12 hours from my family for the holiday, and was just out of a medical leave due to spiraling migraine issues. I had just had a ridiculously dramatic break from my best friend for taking something they said completely wrong (a reoccurring pattern that has ruined everything) and suffice it to say that there weren’t a ton of people happy with me at that moment. My roommate had gone for the holiday to see her family, and I was in the apartment with her cats and a Marie Callendar’s microwave turkey and dressing.

My psyche was completely messed up, I was lonely and tired and thought that no one in the world could cheer me up. But by some completely unexpected reason, for the first and only time that I know of, BBC America showed Robbie Williams’ Live in Knebworth that afternoon, and I settled in and watch the show. And if I can recommend that you do one thing, it’s to do the same. Most of the concert is on YouTube.

In about 90 minutes, I was not only feeling completely better, but I had that typical fan reaction of “Wow, this is a guy who completely gets me.” I now know that a lot of fangirls develop this attachment to Rob and it’s quite irritating to him, and also that there is no way that a British pop star can “get” a 30ish Southern divorced agoraphobic. The main thing I got at that point (and from his quasi-autobiography, which is a fascinating read) is that like me he couldn’t sleep, couldn’t find anything in his life that didn’t turn into some sort of obsession, and he had enough demons on his back to open a haunted house. Those are things that I can relate to.

It’s now been three years since that day with Rob and Marie Callendar’s. Things have greatly changed for both of us. He’s taken much of the last three years off, after his last album was very unfairly slated. More importantly, he now has a steady and absolutely gorgeous girlfriend who he appears to intend to marry. He’s writing freaking love songs. And after a lot of time puttering around in his ODD way, he has finally finished his next album and today made his first proper live performance in three years at the BBC Electric Proms.

God knows how long BBC will allow clips to stay up, but since we’re not getting Electric Proms theatre showings in the US, I highly recommend that the BBC throw us a bone and at least region-code US-only some of the stuff from the show. In the meantime, some stuff is showing up on YouTube.

“Come Undone” is possibly my all-time fave Rob track. It kinda epitomizes the LA experience for me. It’s also one of his best performances at Knebworth. And I think this is the song that got him into the proper pop star mood. He’s got pretty bad stage fright now.

This is a true highlight. The producer of his new album is Trevor Horn, i.e. the Buggles, and “Video Killed the Radio Star” was the first video shown on MTV. Rob’s album is called “Reality Killed the Video Star” mostly in Horn’s honor. It was so cool to hear him cover this.

Rob did a nice bit where he talked about mending fences with his former boyband Take That and how they gave him crap for getting a TT tattoo. He also sings the song “No Regrets”, which he wrote many years ago about the breakup.

Here’s his first proper love song for a specific person that doesn’t involve breaking up with them in the end. Ayda Field is a really lucky lady. I hope he can keep this going.

And the song that made him a legend - “Angels”.

Other songs: Starstruck (Dec sighting!), and Bodies.

Finally, my probable fave song for the album, which I’m importing.

It sounds like Rob has finally grown up. I hope I have too. In any case, I have to thank him for “Rudebox”, an album I genuinely loved, and for music that will always fill a hole in my heart.

Edit: It only took the BBC a few hours to yank all but two of the above clips. Argh. Thanks for listening to me, BBC. At least watch “You Know Me” and “Won’t Do That”, which they apparently left up because the video’s not great.

I’ve been on Twitter since the Ice Age of Social Networking. That means that I joined when I was in North Carolina, before I had a Facebook account, and before the Fail Whale was ever spotted.

I’ve met a lot of really awesome people via Twitter. For awhile, I had a side gig blogging for actual money through Twitter contacts. I had 2,000 followers before Ashton Kutcher had figured out that it might be a way to be known for something more than being Demi Moore’s boytoy. And many, many fun nights were spent flooding my Twitter stream with Emmy liveTweeting and hurricane coverage in-depth analysis (simple fact: I am secretly obsessed with severe weather phenomenon and would die happy if I could do coverage whilst hanging from a light pole on some eastern coast.)

I seriously don’t know what people thought about my oversharing and overTweeting. I know people de-followed me, but I purposefully stayed away with Qwitter. The one person I felt left Twitter because of me resulted in a gigantic one-way hissy fit that was the start of me thinking that maybe being the Queen of Social Media (a title given by a former boss) was not all it’s cracked up to be.

I have always been very shy and very contained. Once a friend of my ex’s said she had no idea what was inside me and was a bit afraid to find out. I spent much of my school career trying desperately to do everything I could do to not be stuck in classrooms by joining every club imaginable and staying mostly on the sidelines of the social circles. I never felt comfortable saying anything. I still don’t.

What’s different now? I have this huge reader base who might see my Tweets amongst the few thousand they got. Before Twitter, I had a really tight circle of friends from both previous life and current life on LiveJournal. But as I got onto Twitter, some of those have faded away

Recently I realized that it’s been literally years since I’ve had a phone call from someone beyond my cousin and my mother just to talk. I’ve found myself, in a strange way, become more introverted, basically because I no longer feel the specialness of an email just for me. Or a phone call just to catch up. I miss the 2 am phone calls.

I’m not deleting my Twitter, simply because once it’s gone it’s ether. No saving in archives like LJ. And I haven’t gone private because I feel in a way that’s acting like I have to hide.

But I haven’t Twittered in 24 hours. I have a Twitter devoted to TV where no one really follows me but I don’t care - it indulges my passion. And I don’t know what this will lead to. All I want to do is get a real phone call again, and to walk my dog without Tweeting when he acts weird all the time, and for my family and friends not to be embarrassed by what I reveal. And I definitely don’t want to Tweet from the Emergency Room or when I’ve been admitted. I want a real, old fashioned conversation where people care.

Sadly, Stephen was found dead on Saturday in Spain at the age of 33. In his honor I’m posting a YouTube link to my one and only favorite Boyzone song, which came out last year in hopes that they could emulate Take That’s successful comeback. But I swear this is one of the best and most accurate love songs ever.

Recently in his healthcare address to Congress, President Obama basically said that some insurance monopolies are using their power to define what their customers should be covered for. In particular, he pointed out that one company in Alabama provides insurance for 90 percent of the insured in the state. I am one of them.

Like Obama, I won’t name them, but there’s a really good chance that if you’re in the South, you’ve had them at some point. And I’ve been told that I’m on the “good plan”, which means I pay for better coverage than, um, the coverage from the same company offered at a different station in this state.

I also have chronic migraine disease. I know that a lot of folks have occasional migraines, and I know how that sucks. It’s been awhile since I’ve been a week without one. I used to have constant ones that never ended but just lowered the pain level a bit some days and up for others. Thanks to a less stressful workplace, a healthier lifestyle and a lot of medication, I am able to work and keep my insurance, but there was a time that I fully expected to be uninsured because I was too ill to stay at the job I’d held before.

Anyway, there are several preventative treatment options for migraineurs. And for many patients, the best ones aren’t medications, because they lose effectiveness over time (and the during-migraine treatments are really not advisable to use when you are working.) Another, marijuana, is not decriminalized for medical use anywhere near the South and would likely jeopardize our job if we tried it otherwise.

Others are defined as “natural medicine”, but have shown true results in medical studies. Biofeedback, acupuncture, and Botox are on the list and have been recommended by almost every migraine doctor I’ve ever seen. But as far as my insurance company is concerned, they aren’t real treatments and thus would not be covered either by my regular coverage or my Flexible Spending Account. The only thing that they covered was chiropractic care, and they disputed almost every FSA claim made for that.

Oh, and another thing - I had coverage in another state from the same company and it did cover all of those things. My migraine doctor said if I were covered by the same company in Tennessee, I could get Botox injections in the muscles above my eyes that would likely help a lot. But not in Alabama.

I am lucky in a very twisted sense, though - I will be starting Botox treatment soon. But not for the migraines. I’ve been diagnosed with spinal dysphasia, which basically means my neck muscles are in constant spasm. Once again, the best and cheapest treatment for this would be weekly massage therapy, which would cost about $35 for a half-hour. But for some strange reason, Botoxin my neck is the treatment that my insurance company will pay for, even though it will cost them $1,000 every three months for the toxin alone.

Like I said, I’m blessed to have insurance at all. I have my worries about a “public option” on the healthcare plan, just because I watched one grandfather slowly die under Medicare because he couldn’t even get regular MRI’s to show the strokes he suffered from, and better treatment for the lymphoma that eventually killed him. In his case, the government was his death panel.

But I do believe one thing - those of us who have chronic illnesses are at the mercy of our healthcare companies to treat them. We pay our premiums and set aside money in FSA accounts, and we deserve to get the treatment we’ve paid for. I realize that this may end up with us having to wait longer for approval for some treatments or tests, but hey, at least we would have the option.

And the others who are too ill to work but also don’t qualify for single-payer insurance because of the chronic illness are just screwed. Even the medication is out of reach. Before Imitrex just went generic, it cost $180 a shot. Would you rather ease your pain or pay the rent?

Frankly, I’m passed the point of worrying whether illegal aliens will get insurance, because I’ve seen a number of possible ones in the ER while I wait for five hours for migraine treatments. And I’m more than happy to pay more if it’s necessary. But it just needs to be fair for all of us who have migraines, fibromyalgia, lupus, arthritis or the other dozens of chronic illnesses people try to live through.

What that means is that this blog will end up finding a new direction, because all I did was talk Brit TV for awhile and y’all are going to get really sick of Robbie-squee posts. I can’t directly talk about work (coworkers and stories are off-limits) and I avoid talking religion or politics here because that never turns out well. And if I just posted about the latest insane thing by dog has done (today he chewed off his brand-new very expensive Easy Walk Harness, which had to be very difficult) it would turn into a blog about Oreo every day. And I have other interests, don’t I?

So feel free to throw stuff at me. Ask me how I ended up where I am and doing what I do. Ask my opinion on something, because I always have one. Ask how I somehow end up drawing the most ridiculous drama into my life, because God knows I want to put an end to it. Heck, just ask about me.

In the meantime, I’ll figure out something to do.

This is one of the best of the post-9/11 videos.

Bless all the people who died on 9/11, and bless the friends and families who miss them still.

FYI, if anyone from Rob’s site admins ever sees this, I’ve had a heckuva time trying to get this f*&^ widget or to “unlock” the video by sharing. Just do the YouTube thing and allow embedding, please.

But what I’ve got on my mind at this second is that a “listening post” for Robbie Williams’ new single has been put on YouTube.

Also, a 30-second preview of the video, which comes out next week.

I have heard this song. In fact, I posted about it a long time ago, when it was “leaked” and then he ended up bringing in Trevor Horn and reworking it. I like it much better now. Musically, it sounds incredible.

I do worry that the lyrics are going to piss people off. At the end, after musing whether or not Jesus died for him, he says “Jesus didn’t die for you”. Glad to hear you’ve become a Unitarian, Rob. And he’s never been one to shy away from controversy. But dear God, please not the reaction that “Rudebox” got (still love that album, tho.)

But he’s definitely right on the chorus — all we’ve ever wanted is to look good naked.

I am not a proper Oasis fan. I feel certain that somewhere Robbie Williams and Blur are collectively laughing their arses off, and rightfully so. Neither Noel or Liam had anything nice to say about anyone, and in particularly they were quite cruel to Rob, who just worshiped them around the time he played at Glastonbury with them.

But “Wonderwall” was one of those songs that will live on like “Angels” and “One” and “Song 2″ will.

The original:

Robbie Williams’ performance of “Wonderwall” at Slane. I like it better.

Finally, Ryan Adams did a cover that was unexpectedly awesome. Probably my fave of them.

Finally, the worst performance of it but the coolest one for doing it with Jay-Z. The Gallaghers had been slamming him for being the headliner for Glastonbury, and he comes out and covers their song, albeit very badly. Poor Jay-Z should never sing but always rap. Then he rocks into “99 Problems”, which is my fave Jay-Z tune. That begins at 1:30.

BTW, if Rob’s album blows up like people are saying, Oasis will be un-broken-up by 2011.

But thanks to io9, I do know of someone who makes me look positively heartless - David Tennant’s Doctor. So go bitch at Russell T. Davies for a bit. After the end of Torchwood, I’m sure he’d like a change of subject.

And while we’re on the subject of apologies, I have now adopted the Randy Pausch Rule of Apologies - any worthwhile one includes 1) acknowledgment (i.e. actually saying you’re sorry) 2) actually stating what you did wrong, and 3) what you will do to make it right. These three things are exceptionally rare. I have to give Michael Vick credit in his apology for actually doing all three things. And it would be helpful if more politicians read “The Last Lecture”.

Sometimes I feel like I shouldn’t apologize so much
That it’s jive, it’s a crutch
I just used when I’m judged
Bein’ fudged by a face I can’t erase and can’t see
Cuz I misplaced a dossier or Monty Python CD
Or somethin’ stupid like that
But Jesus is that so bad
To make my ego go splat
Like a tire goin’ flat
Or fat on a Big Mac
I’m bein’ attacked
Tit for tat
You fuckin’ bureaucrats
You can just apologize back