I've decided tonight to unsubscribe from this list and though I don't expect to be incredibly missed or anything, I kind of wanted to explain why because I hope it might make a little bit of a difference. Sorry, this is quite long. I should admit upfront that I have a blind spot the size of Jupiter when it comes to Sting. I have loved his music since I was eleven (half my life) and I have been slightly in love with the man himself for much of that time. My Jupiter-sized blind spot doesn't prevent me from rolling my eyes a bit when he does yet another corporate sponsorship thing, but it does make me buy every single Sting CD I can get my hands on, gaze adoringly at pictures, go to concerts (except I've only been to two--probably about thirty less than the average person on this list) and so forth. And I will also admit that I am sensitive when it comes to criticism of Sting. It's stupid, but there you are. At the same time, I don't worship his personality. Maybe that has something to do with why I don't really mind the egomania and all the rest? Because it doesn't touch me that closely? But Sting remains the only artist who I like every song by, and that includes U2, who might slip ahead of Sting in my regard if it weren't for Zooropa and Pop. Brand New Day is one of my favourite Sting albums and I don't at all see it as a falling-off for him, but that's another story. I've been on this list for somewhat over a year and by and large I have found it kind of depressing. I was on it for a little while in the fall of 1996, and unsubscribed only because the email address I was on wasn't handling it well. It was about ten thousand times livelier and more pleasant then than now. I know that this is really a Police mailing list. I know that there are quite a few people on here who think the Police blows Sting away and who really don't like Sting solo. I don't want anyone to think that they specifically caused me to leave just because they said something I didn't like about Sting, because I've been considering it already for some months. People are completely entitled to criticise Sting. What I find depressing is what seems like the unrelenting negativity--toward Sting at any rate--and the reluctance to get into anything like an interesting discussion. Maybe other people have better things to do than hang out on a mailing list all the time, but I always thought that the idea of a mailing list was to have interesting discussions about the subject and to share in appreciation of the subject. I don't see much of that happening here and I haven't ever in the past year. It really seems like no one cares--witness the fact that I, a newbie, was the first to post anything after Sting won a Grammy or after he sang at the Oscars--and that depresses me. And I really don't see the point in adding something depressing to my life. Thanks anyway to the people who have contributed something interesting to my appreciation of the Police and Sting, because there are plenty of you here. I may be back some time and I kind of hope things are much happier then. Cheers, Clarissa