Busy Doing Nothing

As mentioned in my previous entry, I think it's safe to say that I won't be writing on a daily basis. I'll still try to write as often as possible, but I feel like a complete loser when I explain to friends that I won't be out 'til late because I'm posting a new entry.

I figured getting my posts written these last few days would be easy. Most of my friends are out of town or busy right now. Roger Mexico is suffering through tech hell week at his job, so he's working ungodly hours. JohnnyB went to visit his family for the weekend. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were working all weekend. Of course, that was just a cue for the other people on my phone list to call me. (For crying out loud, Mike Dangers called me twice yesterday. He never calls.)

Oh and while I'm thinking about it...waiter, bring us another cup of coffee! Corvus has come to play! (Even though I missed him when he was in town....)

The real task, of course, will be making the self castigation stop. I started writing this to get back in the habit of writing on a regular basis, and blowing off writing to go watch movies is not exactly the self-discipline I was looking for. I guess that's what happens when you're your own boss, and you have no management skills.

OK, so it's decided. No more berating myself for not posting every day. Whew. I feel better now.

Brief recap of what's gone on since the last full entry...Nash called me on Friday to request my help with the makeup for his Halloween costume. I can safely say I will not be leaving my day job to be a makeup artist for Limp Bizkit, but it wasn't bad for two amateurs working from a picture in Modern Guitar or whatever magazine it was. I saw him the following day, and he had not been able to get the makeup out of the inside of his ear.

The Fearfest plans fell through again on Saturday, and I ended up at Zappagirl's baking cookies and playing the Millenium Edition of Trivial Pursuit. Timmy kicked our butts. (Critical notes on the Millenium Edition: yes, the see-through plastic pieces are very pretty, but quite impractical. It makes it difficult to discern what pieces of pie you've already got. I spent a good twenty minutes aiming for pink, only to realize it was brown I needed. Also, the picture questions are dumb and gimmicky.) Afterwards, I went over to Roger Mexico's to watch movies. (He had been at the Warehouse with a friend of his.) He filled me in on what I had missed at the club (i.e., not a lot). The theme this year was FetishFest or something like that, and by popular demand they brought back the charity spanking booth, with all proceeds going to AIDS Volunteers of Cincinnati. (Your dominatrix for the evening: Rosencrantz.) He'd meant to donate money, and not get his money's worth (i.e., not get spanked), but apparently was peer pressured into it. Teehee. I can sympathize with him. The last time we did the spanking booth, the owner of the club paid for every employee to come up and get their lumps. OUCH. I recall tending bar with a stinging derrière for a good 30 minutes or so.

But on a good note, about $200 was raised for AVOC this year, and Rosencrantz didn't break any paddles this year.

I didn't do anything on Sunday but sleep and watch TV. Just call me the couch spud.

I had every intention of writing on Monday, but Zappagirl called and invited me over for pizza. I have no will power, especially when I'm hungry. We spent the majority of the night downloading new ringtones onto her cel phone. Her phone now plays Tom Jones' "Sexbomb" if you call her, which she thinks is the funniest thing ever. And I'll agree, it is pretty damn funny.

Halloween was pretty uneventful. Went over to Zappagirl's (again) to watch Toy Story 2. Drank too much coffee, switched to beer. Discovered that Chex Mix is the heroin of the snack food family, because we practically inhaled a family size bag in about an hour or so. (Wait, if we inhaled it, I guess that would make it the cocaine of the snacking genre. Whatever.) Madmatt, a friend from way back when, joined us and we spent a good hour or so checking out his website and lurking in the chatroom. Once again, I really did mean to post last night. I was going to tell ghost stories and everything. Guess I'll have to save 'em for later since all I managed to get typed was that pathetic little apology at 2 am.

Before I move on to what I actually planned on writing about tonight (or Monday, originally), I do have a brief announcement. Dulcify (Roger Mexico's band) is playing at Top Cat's this Friday night with Chivalrous Dogs and Candy Afterlife, and of course I'm pimping the show. If you live in the Queen City area, and you were looking for something to do Friday night, you just found it. Come check 'em out. They'll also be playing at the OurMusik 2000 Festival at Southgate House on November 10th in the parlour. (And if you don't live in the area, then go to their website and take a listen to their MP3s.) I'll be at both shows, so come out and play with me. Buy me a beer and I'll be your best friend!

(end shameless promotion for band)

On to the silliness! The vocabulary word for the day is mondegreen.

mondegreen n. a series of words that result from the mishearing of misinterpretation of a statement or song lyric. For example, I led the pigeons to the flag for I pledge allegiance to the flag.

This has been the source of many loud bouts of giggles in Zappagirl's computer room. We had been reminiscing about our club glory days (nights?) one evening, and got on the subject of how many songs our friends had intentionally changed the lyrics to. Case in point, Ministry's "Thieves." The lyrics are something like "Thieves! Thieves and liars!" but we'd always sung them as "Teeth! Teeth and pliers!" To me, it's always been a fun mosh pit song about going to the dentist.

We picked on Ministry a lot. "Burning Inside" will forever be a song about doing laundry. "Washing with Tide! Washing with Tide!"

But my favorite still has to be our version of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit." Zappagirl and I had gone to Spy Club one night, and we had remarked that if the DJ played some Nirvana, it would be just like the old days at R-Club. Apparently, the DJ was psychic, because the next song was the aforementioned grunge anthem. We both sqealed with delight (we are such girls), and both found ourselves, unprovoked, singing the chorus:

"A to-mah-to! A to-may-to!
A po-tah-to! A po-tay-to!
Ja-la-pay-ño! Ja-la-pee-ño!
I'm albino! I'm albino!"

For those of you not familiar with the collected writings of Kurt Cobain, these are not the lyrics. But this is the only way I sing this song now, and apparently I'm not the only one. (The group of friends I went out with used to sing these lyrics at the top of our lungs every time the DJ played it. We usually drowned out the recording. It's a wonder we never got kicked out of that bar.)

Of course, these are all intentional mondegreens. Unintentional ones are even funnier. A few examples:

My sister used to think one of the lines to "I Can See Clearly Now" was I can see all octopuses in my way. Octopuses, obstacles. I guess a mob of angry cephalopods waving their tentacles at you would be an obstacle.

My mother used to sing One ton of mirrors to "Guantanamera." Thanks for the Spanish lesson, Mom.

I sitll hear the words She's so funky, yeah in the background in Peter Gabriel's "Games Without Frontiers." Guess I didn't take enough French to decode Jeux sans frontières.

Back when Nine Inch Nail's The Downward Spiral was big, a guy came into Zappagirl's record store looking for "that song about the airplane." After a bit of quizzing, the staff determined he was looking for "Closer" and had heard the chorus as I want to fuck you like an aeroplane rather than animal. Numerous avaiation jokes ensued. ("Is that a Cessna in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?")

(For more examples of great moments in human stupidity, go here or here. It will make you feel better about the way you misheard songs.)

Enough with the wackiness. I've been here way too long, and I'm out of water and need to make a pit stop. But it's OK, because as CCR didn't say, there's a bathroom on the right.