Frank Sinatra "My Way"

You'd be pretty surprised, if you started to catalog all the musical cues you didn't even know you knew.

You know to stand, when "Here Comes The Bride" starts.

You know there's a change of scenery and time, when the "Law & Order" Chung-CHUNG hits.

Those are pretty universal, but you can also make specific ones for the world you live in.

And if the world you live in is populated by hordes of drunk college kids, then you need to make the cues as clear as possible.

One of my best high school friends went to college right up the road from me, and it wasn't unusual for me to get a call on a Friday afternoon, saying "We're having a party tonight, c'mon up."

He lived with a bunch of good-looking, heavy-drinking, very fun and very funny guys, piled into a place that looked (and smelled) like you'd expect from a houseful of college boys. A fathers-lock-up-your-daughters kind of place.

The parties were always great, just bordering on out-of-control. They attracted the big crowds and the good-looking girls (which was the intention), but also the kind of meat-head dudes who didn't have any hesitation about getting too drunk and too rough in someone else's house.

But my boys had a plan.

When the night had reached its apex . . . when nothing good could come from letting the party go any further . . . or when the beer had run out . . . they had a plan.

The stereo would be turned to full, ear-splitting, could-be-used-as-psychological-torture levels, and "My Way" by Frank Sinatra, was started up.

And the boys would stand at the front door, with hockey sticks, singing the song, fraternally, at the top of their lungs.

Regular party-goers knew that they had until the end of the song to vacate the premises. Or they would be cleared forcibly, with hockey sticks.

It was a very, very cheerful Get-The-Fuck-Out.

And it worked!


See Frank sing it at Madison Square Garden on Youtube.