Saturday 9

(Link in meme-roll)
Heartbeat Song (2015)
... because Cat recommended it (hey, that's me!)
Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) Kelly Clarkson is singing an upbeat song about falling in love. Think of your favorite love song. Is it about finding love or losing it?

I think this song is about her baby, actually, or maybe I'm misremembering an interview I saw when this song first came out. Or maybe for me it's about my son. Anyway, I don't like songs about losing love. I like silly love songs, but not mindlessly stupid ones.

2) This song was co-written by Kara DioGuardi, who was a judge on American Idol. Kelly was, of course, the first American Idol. Do you watch Idol, The Voice, or America's Got Talent?

Nope.

3) In this video, Kelly is blonde. Clairol based a famous ad campaign around the assertion that "blondes have more fun." Tell us another commercial catchphrase (it can be for any product at all).

"Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun." And yes, I really did type that from memory. So very sad. [Can you tell it's dinnertime? My stomach is apparently running my brain.]

4) As a young girl, Kelly wanted to be a marine biologist. She jokes that she changed her mind after seeing Jaws. Tell us about a movie that really scared you.

Psycho did, of course, even though I was fully prepared and saw it for a psychology course in college. However, I get scared in almost every movie with intense scenes. For crying out loud, I had to be removed from Oliver! as a child because Mr. Bumble terrified me!! And it hasn't ever gotten much better. Ben Hur is another one that I remember having to leave the room during the chariot race because it's so intense.

5) Kelly is very involved with NASCAR, performing at pre-race concerts and appearing at their Champions' Breakfast. Are you a race fan?

I actually am. Not a crazy-loony fan, but I know most of the top-tier driver's names at least and a little about most of them. And Kyle Busch sucks.

6) Kelly is married to Brandon Blackstock, stepson of country superstar Reba McEntire. Are you a country music fan?

I like some country songs. Or maybe I like country-pop. Not so much country-western twang-a-doodle fests.

7) The Blackstocks have a baby girl, River Rose. In May, the family visited an Australian wildlife preserve and introduced her to koalas and kangaroos. Have you visited the zoo this year?

Nope. I haven't really gone to the zoo in probably 7 years or so. Technically, I go to a charity event at a zoo every fall but the zoo itself is incidental, just a location.

8) Upon learning that she was getting criticized on Twitter for being "big," Kelly responded, "Say what you will. It's a free world. It doesn't bother me." How about you? Do you worry what other people think of you?

I don't really worry about it. I know I'm overweight. I know I'm mouthy, bitchy, opinionated and silly. I don't really need to be told any of those things. I do get really fucking upset when I'm talked down/condescended to, or belittled because I'm a female. I'm not stupid. Don't ever think that, no matter how idiotic I act!

9) She bid over $200,000 and won a ring that had once belonged to Jane Austen. (She doesn't have the ring, though; the British government banned its sale because it's a historic artifact and Kelly's money was returned.) She also has a first edition of one of Austen's novels. Who is your all-time favorite writer?

Well, not Jane Austen! I haven't ever gotten more than 10 pages into any of her books, and believe me I have tried several. YAWN. I read a lot of mysteries: Sue Grafton, Sara Paretsky, J.A. Jance. Bill Bryson is good fun. Anne Lamott is amazingly good at finding the perfect words. I like Charles Dickens and Laura Ingalls Wilder and Kent Haruf and Matthew Arnold and Lawrence Block and Lewis Carroll and E.E. Cummings....