"What kind of music do you listen to?" or "Who's your favorite band?" are questions that a lot of people ask when learning about somebody else. But one weird thing I've noticed are how a lot of women with a rather small album collection will answer the question quickly by naming two bands. And they all do it with this empty look in their eyes. Often while chewing gum.

The stranger thing is, I always hear the same 2 bands from each and every one of these women in a given year. How come every time I hear someone say "I like Korn", it's almost always followed by "...n' Limp Bizkit"? Why do these favorite bands come in twos so often? Sometimes it was pop, sometimes it was metal, other times it was something else. But always the same seemingly insepparable pairs.

Now here's something even MORE bizarre: a lot of folks use the same pairs to describe bands they hate at the time. For example, "I HATE stuff like Korn n' Limp Bizkit." Maybe fiercly denouncing bands that the young masses seemed programmed to like is, ironically enough, jumping on a band wagon.

Maybe it's just me, or maybe you'll find that you've heard the following sentences more than a few times before in the corresponding year:

2001: "I listen to, like, you know, Korn n' Limp Bizkit."

2000: "Ugh. I fuckin' hate shit like Britney Spears and The Backstreet Boys."

1997: "Ugh. I fuckin' hate shit like the Spice Girls and Hanson."

1993: "I listen to, uh, Nirvana n' Pearl Jam."

1992: "I listen to, like, Soundgarden n' Alice In Chains."

1991: "Ugh. I hate that rap shit, like MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice."

1990: "I listen to, uh, U2 and REM."

1989: "I like stuff like, uh, Guns n' Roses and Metallica"

1987: "I listen to, tee-hee, Debbie Gibson n' Tiffany."

1986: "I listen to, um, Poison an' Bon Jovi."

(And seeing that I'm only 27, I'm going to make some educated guesses to stretch the list out to a full 20 years ago.)

1984: "I listen to, you know, Van Halen and Def Leppard."

1982: "I listen to, uh, Night Ranger and Journey."

And while on the subject of past music, here's another one of those silly personality tests: