My Favorite Websites

Here, in absolutely no particular order and off the top of my head, are some of the websites I visit every day and why:

Hot Chicks With Douchebags: My uncle turned me onto this site sometime ago, and it remains one of my favorite concepts of all time. While it is a very mocking and cynical website, there actually is some good social observation going on, not to mention hysterical writing from the site's author, DB1. Check out the archives, in particular the Hall of Scrote. My personal favorite is Peaches, but there are many other great ones, including Gator and Oompa Prompa.

Andrew Sullivan: One of the best writers and social thinkers we have, and as a gay Catholic conservative, Sullivan has a unique and powerful perspective on two of the most hot button issues right now, namely religion and equal rights for homosexuals. His writings on Obama, whom he fully endorses, are the most erudite I've seen. It's also fascinating to go through his archives to see his transformation from Bush defender to Bush hater. He also updates something upwards of fifteen to twenty times a day.

GameFAQs: This betrays one of my guilty pleasures/hobbies in life, video games. However, this is an incredible and trailblazing website regardless of its content; this is, in a sense, the original Wikipedia, albeit for a very specific topic. It features a staggering amount of free, typically very high quality information about video games, such as full walkthroughs and strategies, from diehard fans. Much of the writing and ideas are as good and usually better than the stuff that comes out professionally, and the size of some of the documents sometimes boggles the mind (one is close to 400 pages long!) You can find a couple of FAQs I've submitted under my name of Dmikester.

John Scalzi: I have been reading John's blog, the Whatever, since before the term blog existed. John is a terrific and funny writer; it has been amazing to watch his transformation from unknown freelance writer to bestselling, award-winning Sci-fi author. I actually peer edited his first big hit, Old Man's War. Highly, highly recommended.

Diary of a Crossword Fiend (Amy Reynaldo)/Rex Parker Does The NYT Crossword: Another one of my hobbies is crosswords. I try to do at least three or four every day, and no website covers the high quality ones that are out there better than Amy's site. She is one of the top crossword solvers in the country in terms of speed, so don't be discouraged by her times if you go to check it out. Rex Parker's site, while focusing solely on the NYT crossword, has become the major hub for the crossword blogosphere, and you'll see why when you go to the site. Both great websites, updated every day.

The Big Picture: An absolutely brilliant collection of photo sets from all over the world, and of all different kinds of events. Some are tragic, some are uplifting, some are just plain beautiful. Make sure to check out the pictures of Obama's inauguration. This updates about once a week.

You can see other websites I love in my blogroll, including the ones listed here, on the right. Enjoy!