Website of the Month (the Year!)

I am not a Web-slut, like some people.  I don't browse and roam at random, all over the place.  I am fiercely loyal to the sites I like, but there are very few of them.   Therefore, my recommendations of other blogs and websites have been considerably less than monthly.  In fact, we haven't had one at all for quite a while now.     I think it is high time that I wrote an encomium for Running After My Hat.  Its author, JES, has become my most regular commenter over the past year or so (and a valued personal correspondent, tech guru, and occasional Web research assistant too), but I do not recommend his blog purely out of friendship or gratitude - it is thoroughly excellent in every way: consistently well-written, amazingly wide-ranging, stimulating and amusing.   I particularly love his occasional What's In A Song? feature, exhaustively researched essays on classic songs, covering the history of their composition, musical structure, pop culture trivia, memorable performances, and many other fascinating side avenues too.   Another great favourite is the regular Friday post where he takes a poem from the whiskey river literary blog as the starting point for a stream-of-consciousness (sometimes more of an avalanche-of-consciousness) collation of loosely related poetry, prose, song, and much else besides.  It is always a highlight of my week, and I can hardly wait to see what he's going to entertain us with today (since he's based in America, I don't usually get to see his Friday morning post until Saturday).   If you haven't yet clicked over on to his site from one of his comments here or one of my previous mentions of him, please do so at once.  You won't be disappointed.