The first installment of The Passenger ran on Feb. 25, 1998, a month to the day after Bryan the General Manager casually mentioned that he'd like to see me try my hand at a different kind of web review column - one that favored content over design, a pop culture gospel that would out-suck Suck. While I haven't, in my opinion, hit that milestone yet (and I enjoy reading Suck as much as you do; don't send me any freaking pro-Suck mail, as I will mock you), the positive reaction to The Passenger has been little short of staggering. The readers rave, the webmasters smile, and my paycheck continues to appear in my account, almost a year after Bryan confidently predicted he'd strangle me within a fortnight.

These 10 sites are the ones I've found myself revisiting again and again - showing them to friends, breathlessly waiting for updates or simply enjoying the content that led me to choose them in the first place. Enjoy them again or for the first time - touch them, love them! Hah, hah!
 

One of my first picks. While a pinhole camera is simple, the photographs it produces are not, and this site beautifully illustrates that truism. I can't really do the photography justice in this space - hey, I don't have a thousand words! - but I can tell you that Charles LoVerme's QuickTime VR pinhole still embodies the most effective use of the plugin.
 

Vince Collins, you are the King of all Dimensions. Play with his intelligent, bizarre multimedia animations until you understand where they come from. I'm still working on that, myself. Visit now, while "Speedway Thrills" and "The Al Fresco Story" are still available.
 

Hey, why not? I dig this homage to the cautionary 1976 MGM sci-fi classic almost more than I love the movie. In Logan's world promiscuity is encouraged, hallucinogenic drugs are legal, everyone wears pastels and reside in a giant, domed shopping mall. Relive! Relive!
 

A classic. Roadside America celebrates every kitschy diversion, small-town freakshow and vintage landmark in the US of A, with the kind of awe and dignity accorded the Parthenon and Stonehenge. If you've ever driven out of your way to stand under a statue of Popeye, you'll understand.
 

At once hilarious, angry, thought-provoking and puzzling, the essays of Brett Leveridge are a must-read. At the very least, you should meet all the fine gentlemen who courted his mother. And he's the only essayist on NPR who doesn't adversely affect my driving.
 

I wanna take you higher! This terrific space site puts Joe Q. Public questions to Jim Lovell, Buzz Aldrin and Story Musgrave. And yes, Virginia, they explain the zero-gravity toilet in terms more dignified than I would use. Forget "Armageddon" - this is the real rock.
 

The literate, trippy quartet's official website is as witty and well composed as "El Oso," their latest album (double plug!). Even if you've never heard a note of their music (MPEG and WAV files abound; you have no excuse), reading Doughty's song backgrounds will knock your ass out.
 

The creator of Salon's "Story Minute" sent me a very nice letter, which made me giddy 'cause I honestly believe she's one of the absolute best storytellers out there. Every week, she spins a tale that shames every movie that came out last summer. And her personal site rocks.
 

The San Fernando Valley Folklore Society means business. They will prove to you that Walt Disney isn't frozen, New Coke wasn't a publicity ploy and that no one ever lost their kidney in a motel bathtub. I could read this stuff all day.
 

I just checked again, and I'm still not on DH's ever-growing "Dick List," an index of every jerk, cad, cheapskate, freak, pervert, wife-beater and scumbag in America. Perhaps it hasn't been updated recently. I love this site the way you love your spouse - in brief, very intense bursts. Nikol, sweetie, darling ...
 

There's a few other sites - oh, about 50 or so - that I would have liked to include here. I think I can squeeze five more sites in without busting the block: Mark Harden's splendid online gallery The Artchive, Connor Ratliff's Elvis Costello fan site Bright Blue Times (some of the most lucid music criticism I've ever read), Rodney Alan Greenblat's Center for Advanced Whimsy, Max Cannon's evil, evil comic Red Meat (we hate you, Milkman Dan!), and the web home of "Thrift Score" author and cable-TV movie reviewer Al Hoff. You go, girl.

A great big Passenger smooch goes out to Michelle Felice and Guy Schackman, who put the images and HTML to this accursed page every week; to Scott Dickensheets, who created the uncanny likeness of me that graces the top of the page; to Gregory Crosby, who subbed for me while I was drunk in Seattle; lastly, to the evil geniuses of Department Lemur, who have spared my life yet another next day.

Thanks for coming this far, friends and neighbors. As per usual, all site suggestions, correspondences, waxings and wanings will reach me at passenger@vegaslounge.com. See you next year!