Madonna was so flamboyant in terms of her look, her style, her public pronouncements, her religious taboo-smashing.

It goes without saying that 'Buncha Losers' comedies speak to tough times. The massive unemployment of the Reagan years gave us 'Taxi,' 'Cheers' and the genre-defining 'Night Court,' a show you could never admit to watching without making people feel sorry for you.

Baseball's Opening Day is full of time-honored traditions: the President throws out the first ball, the Cubs' starting pitcher walks away with a 54.00 ERA, the Royals get mathematically eliminated from the pennant race.

I'd shut the whole world down just to tell you.

When I started out as a music journalist, at the end of the 1980s, it was generally assumed that we were living through the lamest music era the world would ever see. But those were also the years when hip-hop exploded, beatbox disco soared, indie rock took off, and new wave invented a language of teen angst.

I was totally clueless about social interaction, and completely scared of girls. All I knew was that music was going to make girls fall in love with me.

One nice thing about growing up Catholic is it makes you open-minded about other people's religions, since ours is nuttier than yours.