They Might Be Giants "What's That Blue Thing Doing Here?"

There's a Youtube video that's appeared on my Facebook feed a number of times in the last few days, featuring a comedian delineating the difference between couples who don't have kids, and couples who do.  A number of times, he repeats the phrase, "You have no idea."

I'm sure there is also a rich comedy vein to be tapped by a married person, explaining to unmarried folks that they also have no idea what actually happens in a marriage.

Please examine the picture below.

I can tell you what's on the left.  It's a LL Bean tote bag, with my son's name on it.  We use the bag for when he does at overnight at Grandma's house.  In it, is his coat.  The bag is on the floor of my bedroom.

Not terribly unusual.

It's the object center-right that is confounding.

It is a large metal bowl.  Normally, I would use that for food preparation.  For instance, if I am making meatloaf, this particular metal bowl is excellent for mixing up ground beef and bread crumbs.

Occasionally, this bowl will be appropriated by the kids to house a bunch of Legos or Little People.  Or be used as a drum.

Back to the picture:  Inside the bowl is an thin old sweatshirt belonging to my wife.

I noticed this bowl-n-sweatshirt combination about a month ago.

Honestly, it didn't really register the first couple of times.

I live with an artist and two small children.  And I am pretty slobby.  Between us, the house is always in some level of disarray and disorganization.  If not outright chaos.

Not that we never clean up.  It's just that the speed of disorganization is much greater that the speed of organization.

In my daily bit of cleaning up and clearing up, I'd walk by that bowl and think about taking it to the sink to be cleaned.  I'd think about grabbing the sweatshirt and tossing it into the laundry basket.

But for some reason, the sweatshirt in the bowl began to intrigue me.

WHY was this sweatshirt in a bowl?  And who put it there?

I decided to wait it out.

Could this be the work of my wife?

Certainly.  She often runs art lessons and camps out of our home, and one of the more popular projects she does, is tie-dying with the kids.  Maybe that's why she needed the metal bowl, as a plastic one would stain.

If I threw the sweatshirt in the laundry, the process she had started would be broken, and might even fall off the checklist.  Maybe this bowl was on the floor because she was going to get to it, when she found some time.

I let days pass.  The sweatshirt remained in the bowl amongst other chattel on the bedroom floor.

Another thought occurred to me.  Maybe this was the work of the kids.

Imaginative play is huge in our house.  Sacred, practically.

I do think this comes from living with an artist.

Our basic parenting philosophy is that as long as it isn't dangerous or permanently damaging, the kids can use most anything in the house, to create their visions.

This is why it is not uncommon to find a number of building blocks attached to the bottom of a pair of shoes using hair elastics.  They're homemade stilt-stompers!  Or to find a zoo's worth of stuffed animals laid out across their bedroom floor, each one covered with a face cloth or dishtowel.  "They're having a sleepover in their tiny sleeping bags!"

Was this a part of some child-created vignette?  The sweatshirt was a baby, and this was a crib?  It was a lizard and the bowl was a terrarium?

I left the bowl alone, more curious than ever.

Weeks passed.

Oh sure, any of the thousands of times I passed by the bowl, I could have said, "Honey/Kids, why is this sweatshirt in this bowl?"  But I was more curious to know what would become of this bowl-n-sweatshirt combination.

Nearly a month went by.

The thought occurred to me that maybe no one put the sweatshirt in the bowl.  I mean, no one put the sweatshirt in the bowl with intention.  The sweatshirt just ended up in the bowl.

And if that were the case, then were my wife and kids also passing by the bowl multiple times a day, wondering like I was, "Why is that sweatshirt in that bowl?  I don't know, but I'm sure whoever put it there, they had their reasons.  I'd better leave it alone."

When you live alone, you know where everything is, and why you put it there.  And if you don't, you only have yourself to blame.

But for those of you who are not married/don't have kids . . . you have no idea.

I learned to accept this early on in marriage/parenthood.

For instance, I barely flinch when, on Thanksgiving, I ask "Where is the potato masher?" and receive the answer, "With the print-making art supplies."

And when you have kids, you just acclimate to the condition of finding things where they don't belong.  We even made up a little song about it, called "Why Is That Pea On The Bathroom Floor?"

One day a week or so ago, I noticed that the bowl was in the sink.  And I saw the sweatshirt come out of the laundry.

I didn't ask why.

Sometimes things just appear where you wouldn't expect them to.  And they disappear just ask quickly.  It's just part of marriage/parenthood.


Epilogue:

I had resisted asking anyone in my family about the sweatshirt in the bowl.  But after spending last night writing this post . . . well, the curiosity has overwhelmed me.

As I was sending my wife out the door to work, I corralled her and had her look at the picture for this post.

"Did you do this?"

"Yes.  It has a big stain on it, so I was going to dye it."

Mystery solved.



Hear the song on Youtube.


Hear the whole "Fingertips" suite on Youtube.

They Might Be Giants "Istanbul Not Constantinople"

A couple of months ago, I did a series of posts about songs that inadvertently (or perhaps intentionally) taught me something.

With the country Turkey in the news this song came to mind, as it formed my understanding that places like Istanbul, New York and even Aquinnah might have previously been called something different.


Hear the song on Youtube.

They Might Be Giants "Your Racist Friend"

All eyes were suddenly on me.  I had said that last line a little louder than I realized I guess, because the gears of the room had ground to a halt.  And I was the spanner in the works . . .

It was my house.  I didn't really know any of these guys.  And if I'd thought about it, I wouldn't have really cared if they liked me or didn't like me or whatever.  They weren't my friends.

They weren't my roommate's friends either.  Not if this is where we found ourselves.

Living in the farmhouse we called 7 Maples was, for me, a lovely continuation of my college years---free and unattached and late nights and drinking beer and having fun with friends.

As for my roommate and her friends, they were a few years younger.  College age.  So it wasn't so much a continuation, as, well, just the college years for them.

She knew a lot of guys.  And during breaks from college, when high school friends would come back to town, these college boys would show up at our place.  Presumably because they all still lived at their parents.

I think my roommate (in the minds of these guys) was kind of like the kid in the neighborhood that you didn't necessarily want to be your best friend, but, she had a pool.  So you hung out.

And that's how I came home to a dozen or so guys hanging around my living room, drinking beer and shooting the shit.  I stood in the doorway to the living room, observing, listening.  Nothing unusual.  Nothing I would have been upset about.

But I was protective of the roommate, and I could see this kid-with-the-pool thing.  I heard the way they talked to her.  Talked down to her.

I had heard many of these guys talk trash about her on other occasions.

And that put me off.

But when the racist jokes started, that's when things turned . . .

"What do you call a black guy who . . ."

"Please stop," my roommate meekly protested.

The joke teller paused for a split second, and kept going, even as their host was saying, "No, don't."

Buoyed by the laughter when the joke landed, and by the weak protest of their host, another guest offered a joke on the same theme.

"What do you call a black guy who . . ."

"Really guys.  Stop it.  I don't want to hear it."

But her protestations were only fuel.  The joke was delivered with more gusto.

It made me sick.

The racist jokes made me sick.  And the total lack of fucking respect for her made me sick.

A third jokester started.

"Okay, okay.  What do you call a black guy who . . ."

"THAT'S FUCKING ENOUGH.  NO MORE RACIST JOKES IN MY HOUSE."

All eyes were suddenly on me.  I had said that last line a little louder than I realized I guess, because the gears of the room had ground to a halt.

"Enough," I said again, more gently.

And then I stepped out of the doorway and into the recesses of the house.  Half embarrassed about by outburst.  Half furious that I would have to make it in the first place.

I heard conversation slowly start again from the room.  But within 5 minutes, the crowd was excusing itself, and within 10 minutes, they were all gone.

It was the strangest thing.  I had never thought of myself as so powerful.  I cleared a room full of guys who could just as easily kicked my ass, with two short sentences.

Even stranger, was the way these guys reacted to me when they would see me around later.  Instead of hating, or even acting embarrassed, they did something I completely did not expect.

They respected me.

I was given some level of deference by these idiots, who so easily disrespected and steamrolled my roommate (and I'm sure many others), and instead was treated with a cautious respect.

It was a good life lesson.

I'm a pretty shy guy.  Not one to rock the boat, or broadcast strong feelings to a crowded room.

But this vignette gave me the confidence to speak up when necessary, and to even speak combatively.  And know it was actually more likely to win you friends than enemies.


Hear the song on Youtube.

They Might Be Giants "Put Your Hand Inside The Puppet Head"

It’s fun living with an artist. You never know what you might come home to.

Last week, I came home to puppets!

The puppet bonanza actually started with me.

As one of my many Dad-Is-In-Charge-Because-Mom-Is-At-Work timekillers/distractions, I will sometimes put socks on my 3 year old’s hands and tell her to do a puppet show.

Lots of time is spent finding a stage (usually the baby gate), a curtain (baby blanket) and a few choice props to interact with.

My daughter doesn’t really get that she can give the puppet a voice, I usually get a mimed Yes or No to my questions directed at the puppet.

My Mother-In-Law, encouraging creativity, got us a puppet making kit for Christmas . . . and while it was a neat idea, I’m not as crafty as I’d like to think I am. The glued on bits of felt all fell off within a day or so.

But this Spring, somewhat out of nowhere, my Art Teacher/Artist wife decided that she wants to learn how to sew.

My Mom lent her a sewing machine, gave her a few simple instructions, and let her go to town. And when I came home last week, Voila! Puppets!

I wanted to make a video to show off the puppet, but I had to corral the squirmy one year old, so he’s on my lap, while the 3 year old explains details about the creation.

You’ll see the baby reach out for the puppet, and I immediately thought of this song, wanting to say:

DON’T TOUCH THE PUPPET HEAD! QUIT IT!!!


See the video on Youtube.


See the video on Youtube.

They Might Be Giants "James K Polk"

Here's another Weekend Post:

Happy President's Day!



Weekend posts are a chance to revisit songs that have happy memories, not of anything in particular, other than just hearing the tunes.

Many of these songs were tracks that I played during my 90s stint as an Alternative/Modern Rock radio show. They're tunes that I hardly hear these days, but are wonderful to revisit.

Click on the "Weekend Posts" label below, to see other posts like this.

Pete Weiss “Robert Robbs”

All Time Top Five Songs Under 90 Seconds . . .

From time to time on Every Day I Write The Blog, I do a week’s worth of my five favorite songs on theme. For the All Time Top Five rules, see this previous post.

What’s the connection between super short songs, and real world, yet hilarious topics?

They Might Be Giants are the masters of this, with songs about toupees and brooms and James Polk, in two minutes or less.

The Ramones went down the same kind of path with tunes that seem pretty much straight out the mouths of the band members---not the result of some literary exercise. “Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment” is more of an exclamation, than a piece of poetry.

Can you imagine Van Morrison, or Ray Lamontagne, or Joni Mitchell (or insert your own legendarily serious artiste) writing a song about Hotel Detectives, Sniffing Glue or the man who actually delivers their mail?

Pete Weiss lives out in western Massachusetts, and seems to effortly toss off hilarious, memorable dittys, “ripped from the headlines” of his actual life.

Robert Robbs would deliver the mail to Pete Weiss’ door, every day, as Pete and his band were making the album “Pete Weiss And The Rock Band.” So Pete invited Robert in, to introduce this song, about Robert Robbs.

Hear "Robert Robbs" with Robert Robbs' intro.

Buy the "Pete Weiss And The Rock Band" here.

They Might Be Giants "Hey Mr. DJ I Thought You Said We Had A Deal"

Well, I of course have great affection for songs about DJs. I am a DJ, I am what I play. Fortunately, I don't play techno, because there ARE a lot of songs about DJs in dance music, but they're not as interesting as Bowie or Van Morrison or They Might Be Giants.

I love that this one is probably the happiest sounding DJ songs out there, but it's about Payola/Pay For Play. I'm a little too young to have experienced it firsthand, but some of the old Promo folks that I talk to on a weekly basis have Some Stories, if you can get them going. Anything to get the record on the radio. And by anything, I think they generally meant coke. Hey, it was the Eighties.

They Might Be Giants have a bevy of songs where they take on a character in first person, be it a Kid (the Malcolm In The Middle theme) or The Replacements ("Hi, We're The Replacements"). And the charm of them is that they are all sung, unmistakably, by the same characters, John and John. No attempt is made to embody the role. With the possible exception of the role of They Might Be Giants, who's voices and persona they effect, in the song "They Might Be Giants." Boyee!

Hear "Hey Mr. DJ I Thought You Said We Had A Deal"

Hear "We're The Replacements"

Hear "Boss Of Me"

Hear "They Might Be Giants"

See the video Here