Filed under: Music | Tags: Music, John Frusciante, Red Hot Chili Peppers, guitar, Chili Peppers, Stadium Arcadium, Instrumentals, Jupiter, Bass, Flea
(This article goes along with this video.)
Stadium Arcadium: The Chili Peppers’ latest album; and what looks like their last with John Frusciante contributing his transcendent six string poetry. I love the album for all of the reasons someone loves a double album: getting to hear a wide variety of songs you wouldn’t get if they’d chosen to trim it down to eighty minutes. The counter-argument is that with so many songs, there are bound to be some that aren’t top notch. I say that with the talent that these four have, I would’ve bought an album made up of twenty discs. Even if ten of them just had John talking about what kind of cereal he has in the morning.
The two discs are named after the Gods Jupiter and Mars. In astrology Jupiter represents the need to expand oneself and grow. It is associated with the urge for exploration and freedom. Mars on the other hand represents energy, sexuality and aggression. I remember reading something John wrote, saying that these two ideas were well represented on Stadium Arcadium. I think that is what makes Stadium such a fantastic album. It retains the underlying energy and libido that characterized their earlier crazy days filled with mayhem and socks filled with cocks. But here that energy underlies and is adorned with fantastic melodies and harmonies. There’s a real virility to these songs that are bursting with life, and at the same time exploring beautiful sonic landscapes.
What I’ve done here is taken bits from the instrumental versions of each song on the first disc. They’re bits that I didn’t fully appreciate when I heard them on the album in their complete forms. At the same time, when I did hear the complete songs again afterwards, it made me like them even more. By coming to appeciate how fantastic these parts were on thier own, I also came to appreciate how well they fit together with the drums and vocals. I picked most of the bits from each song based on the guitar, so that’s why all of the pictures are of John. That of course isn’t meant to take anything away from Flea and his funky funky self.
Dani California: Bridge (2:11 – 2:30) <- Where it is on the actual song
I never really noticed how cool and watery the guitar sounded here. According to John it was put through a modular synthesizer, "processed with the Doepfer's LFO (Low Frequency Oscillator) controlling its highpass filter, so that the filter opens and closes rhytmically". I wish I knew enough so that I could tell the difference between the sentence I just quoted – spoken by someone who knows what they're talking about – and this sentence that I'm just making up: "it was warped with a YLK, dubbed using the string oscillator, that vibrates on the low end atonally". One day David, one day. He also talked about how the drums during this section were filtered, and only played in one speaker to begin with, and then pan to the center while opening up. Pretty neat bridge!
Snow ((Hey Oh)): Pre-Chorus (1:32 – 1:46)
This sounds pretty simple at first, but if you listen really closely (or do what I did and look at the tab), you’ll see that he’s actually playing this:
|———————————|————————————|
|—9—9—9—9—9—9—9—9-|—9—9—9—9—9—11—11—12-|
|———————————|————————————|
|———————————|————————————|
|-7—7—7—7—7—7—7—7—|-7—7—7—7—7—7—-9—-9—-|
|———————————|————————————|
|————————————————-|
|—-12—-12—-12—-12—-12—-12—-12—-12-|
|————————————————-|
|————————————————-|
|-11—-11—-11—-11—-11—-11—-11—-11—-|
|————————————————-|
|———————————————|
|—-12—-12—-12—-16—-14—12—11—9-|
|———————————————|
|———————————————|
|-11—-11—-11—-11—-11—-x—-9—-x—|
|———————————————|
That style of alternating between low and high strings that he did a lot on Niandra, or the Scar Tissue riff, for example. But it’s done a lot quicker here, and is really hard to play.
Charlie: Chorus (0:47 – 1:07)
I just found this cool to hear without the vocals, because it follows a different path than they do, and is hard to hear with them. Anthony said that the instrumental track he got for Charlie was his favourite on the album, and it is pretty bad-ass. Wow I just noticed how taking the time to hyphenate the word ‘bad-ass’ really takes away from its bad-assness. Before this section during the verse John’s guitar is in a different time signature from the drums, here it settles back in for a while. I was pretty tempted to put the next section (“Your right, I’m wrong…”) which I guess would be the bridge? For a long time it was my favourite part of the album. I didn’t do thatbecause it’s easy enough to hear on the complete track.
Stadium Arcadium: Verse and Chorus (2:00 – 2:30)
A bit of a surprising choice for a title track in my opinion, but it’s got some neat things going for it. I don’t know what it is, but hearing John doing those backward guitar licks made me really sad that he’s not in the band any more. It was probably thinking about all of the experimental elements that he brought to the band, and how much meticulous love he put into every song. The fact that you could hold the Peppers up against other bands with interesting production quirks and experimentation because they had John in their ranks made me think about that giant hole that he’ll leave in their sound. It’s like losing an amazingly skilled player to free agency, you miss having him on your side. That all came to mind during this section, and I think the tone during the chorus is pretty great.
Hump de Bump: Interlude and Chorus (2:21 – 2:55)
This was cool because I never heard that little build up during the drum bonanza before. And that riff is so chucky (to borrow an adjective) and awesome. You can hear that the drum bled into the guitar or bass mics on this.
She’s Only 18: Chorus (1:45 – 2:18)
Again I chose this bit just because I never really heard it properly on the complete version. It really is a rockin’ riff. (Wow ‘rockin’ riff’ sounds about as un-rockin’ as possible.) It’s one of those big power-chordy choruses that they had on a few songs on Stadium. I gathered from interviews, but I might be wrong, that those sorts of parts comes from Chad and John. That’s true in this case, because Anthony said the chorus used to be a ‘hazy-phasey’, weird chord progression that John had come up with, before he (John) came up with the huge chorus that the final version has. I didn’t really appreciate how huge it was until I heard it on its own.
Slow Cheetah: Guitar Solo (3:33 – 4:03)
I love the sound of the chorus, sounds kind of like when you strum with a really thin pick. The guitar solo just fits in perfectly. Really uplifting and joyful. It also comes across, to me anyway, as sounding very relaxed and content. That fits in with Flea’s idea as to the meaning of the song, which is: enjoying life by living it at a slower pace. It’s really interesting how hearing the meaning of the words to a song, impacts the way you perceive the meaning of sound in that song. On a side note, this might be my favourite song on the album at the moment.
Torture Me: Intro and Verse (0:08 – 0:28)
To me that bass riff that opens the song is the most serious and grave sounding thing that they’ve ever recorded. It gives me the sense that what’s coming is something truly important. Now that I hear John’s guitar clearly I feel like it follows suit and also sounds very serious. I picture the band out of their usual colourful attire; dressed in black, with high collars, on a windy hill, in slow motion, deliberating over something that will affect the entire world. I wonder if I’m the only one to get that feeling? Anyway. I like the way John’s guitar sort of washes over the accented single notes that Flea is playing. It’s also cool how he switches chords just before the end of every bar instead of at the start of the next one.
Strip My Mind: Pre-Chorus and Chorus (3:32 – 4:00)
What gets me about this little snippet is the buildup in intensity of the rhythm guitar as it goes into the chorus. It’s also neat how the lead guitar sort of continues the same ’sentence’ once the song does get into the chorus. I really really the change in tone of that lead guitar throughout this bit. I feel like those types of production elements defined a big part of the sound on the album, and did give it a pretty spacey aura. When a few of those sounds are layered, you get an album where each songs feels like a world you can stick your head into. Here’s an article where John explains the effects and production he used on each song.
Especially in Michigan: Verse (1:18 – 1:45)
Same sort of thing. Listen to how that tone morphs with the feedback, unreal.
Come on Girl: Pre-Chorus and Chorus (2:51 – 3:08)
Apparently the hardest bassline on the album. Also one made up by John. I guess it’s the same sort of idea for three songs in a row, but the mixture of all of those different sounds is mind-boggling to me. The interplay between the bass and guitar is also really cool here. Again another big chorus.
Wet Sand: Outro (4:00 – 4:22)
Sorry to cut it off right before the solo; you can actually probably get blue balls from that. This is a section that’s just overflowing with so much energy, building up towards that cathartic, explosive solo. I was sure that those arpeggios were from a harpsichord, but according to John that’s actually a guitar! “At the end of the song there’s an arpeggiated guitar part created by sloing the tape down and playing harmonies a third up, on the treble pickup, which made it sound exactly like a harpsichord. I’m convinced that’s what Hendrix did on ‘Burning of the Mignight Lamp.’” I never know how to end a quote that ends with a quote, those three apostrophes look strange. Are they still called apostrophes if they’re part of quotation marks? The word apostrophe comes from the roots ‘apo’ meaning from and ’strophe’ meaning to turn away. Which makes sense when they’re replacing a letter like in ‘they’re’ but not if they’re around something, like in ‘they’re’. I wonder if anyone stuck around long enough to get that nugget of info? Great outro though; I’d never noticed that lick in the middle of it.
Hey: Bridge (3:40 – 4:14)
Probably some of Frusciante’s most beautiful guitar playing, and that is saying something. I loved being able to really hear it on the instrumental track. Can’t say much about something like that, just go ahead and listen to it a few times.
Thanks for reading! I wonder if this is what will finally bring in some readers via the youtube video, like an unsuspecting horde following a trail of donuts into a scientology meeting. But if you liked what you read, and would like to have more of the feeling of dopamine rushing into your nucleus accumbens check: this, this, this and/or (but preferably and) this out! Or check it all out! Or whatever, I’m just glad some of you got this far!
I’ll be doing one for Mars eventually. Hope you enjoyed this. Happy Holidays!
Filed under: Etymologies
be there or be square: if you are not present at said event, you are not part of the ‘in crowd’
Origin:
The term originates in 18th century England, during the industrial revolution. It relates to a law (1) passed in 1782 stating that “when the head of the man turns square, no further work shall they dare”. The figurate language of the law referred to the fact that if a worker became disoriented or mentally incapacitated from over work, they would be given the rest of the day off, along with pay. Workers soon found a loophole in the law, and began wearing boxes on their heads when going to work (2). Judges at the time ruled that according to the letter of the law, these workers had to be given the prescribed amount of time off. Soon knowledge of this tactic became widespread and people knew they had two options when it came to work: to be there or to be square. The current meaning came about when factory owners began a slew of propaganda, giving ‘being square’ a negative connotation. However this didn’t have the effect they’d hoped and eventually the law had to be reworded in order to avoid the loophole (3).
Footnotes:
1 – The “Inverse Square Law”.
2 – In fact the term loophole originates from the holes these men would carve into the boxes in order to see, literally ‘keeping them in the loop’.
3 – Ironically leading to many box making factory owners losing their jobs.
Filed under: Music | Tags: Fourth Wall, Glass Onion, Jay-Z, John Lennon, Lil Wayne, Paul McCartney, rap, Reality, The Beatles, The White Album
There’s a scene in The Empire Strikes Back (when C-3P0, Han, Leia and Chewie are escaping Hoth) where C-3P0 looks at the camera and says “how typical”. Who is he talking to? Certainly not the scruffy nerf herder (sorry) who just went into another room and closed the door (could have said: into the Hoth Echo Docking Bay but I didn’t) along with her worhipfulness and the walking carpet. Threepio is talking to us: the audience. Film aficionados call it ‘breaking the fourth wall’. The term originates from plays with three walled sets, with a fourth imaginary wall separating the audience from the characters. To ‘break the fourth wall’ is to talk to the audience directly. It allows the characters to draw attention to the fact that they are characters in a story, creating a ‘meta-fiction’. It seems to me that John Lennon breaks the fourth wall in “Glass Onion”, the earliest example I can think of this happening in a popular song. And what’s more, he breaks it speaking specifically as himself.
First lets take a look at “Glass Onion”, the third song on the wonderful carnival of quilted oddites that is The White Album.
I told you about strawberry fields,
You know the place where nothing is real
Well here’s another place you can go
Where everthing flows.
Looking through the bent backed tulips
To see how the other half lives
Looking through a glass onion.
I told you about the walrus and me-man
You know that we’re as close as can be-man.
Well here’s another clue for you all,
The walrus was Paul.
Standing on the cast iron shore-yeah,
Lady Madonna trying to make ends meet-yeah.
Looking through a glass onion.
Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah.
Looking through a glass onion.
I told you about the fool on the hill,
I tell you man he living there still.
Well here’s another place you can be,
Listen to me.
Fixing a hole in the ocean
Trying to make a dove-tail joint-yeah
Looking through a glass onion
In this song John Lennon addresses the person listening to the song directly when he says “I told you about strawberry fields”, and again at the beginning of each of the next two verses. This of course isn’t the first time a singer has said ‘I’ and ‘you’ in a song, but this is unique for two reasons.
i) The person saying ‘I’ is John Lennon the songwriter, not a character in the song. He establishes that it is him by referring to things that he, John Lennon, has done in the past. In other songs, when a singer uses the word ‘I’, it could be anyone really. For example:
“I give her all my love,
that’s all I do.”
The Beatles – And I Love Her
Here there is nothing about the ‘I’ that tells you it is specifically Paul McCartney; he doesn’t mention any characteristics that define him specifically. In Glass Onion John talks about songs that he himself has written. Even among other cases where the singer talks about things that are personal, Glass Onion stands apart. For example:
“Let me take you down, ’cause I’m going to Strawberry Fields.”
The Beatles – Strawberry Fields
I would argue that Glass Onion is a different case because in it John is talking about specific and actual events that apply specifically to him. Other songs have obviously been in the first person, but here John explicitly defined the fact that the ‘I’ is him by listing qualities that apply only to him, not a vague narrator. This is helped by the fact that he and his history are so well known that he is able to refer to that history to define the narrator as himself.
ii) In other cases where bands have said ‘you’, they weren’t referring specifically to the person listening. They may have been referring to a character in the song. For example:
“You think you lost your love,
Well, I saw her yesterday.
It’s you she’s thinking of
And she told me what to say.”
The Beatles – She Loves You
Or they may have been referring to a general other, which the listener may interpret as being them. Again:
“Let me take you down, ’cause I’m going to Strawberry Fields.”
The Beatles – Strawberry Fields
In Glass Onion John clearly identifies ‘you’ as the person listening to the song. He (again specifically John Lennon) mentions things that he’s done to you in the past. Having told you about strawberry fields, the walrus and the fool on the hill. He isn’t speaking to a ‘you’ in the song, or to a ‘you’ in general. It is very obvious that he is speaking to a ‘you’ completely removed from the world of the song. This ‘you’ is specifically defined as the people listening. (1)
So John is speaking directly to us, this allows him to break down other walls. He actually mentions other songs he’s written, in a song. In this way Glass Onion implies a reality that exists outside of it: both the reality of the songwriter above the song; and that of other songs horizontal to it. They all come to be present at the same time. The insular worlds of other Beatles songs are suddenly combined with that of Glass Onion. In this way all of those other songs also break through the walls separating them from us. The song is ‘aware’ that they are all songs in the Beatles canon, and attention is called to that fact. When this is done in comedy (like when Stewie says “I thought we had a clip there”), the result is called meta-comedy. It is part of the general concept of metafiction: fiction that calls attention to the fact that it is fiction. It exists on two levels, the fiction itself, and the worlds outside of it that it alludes to. Maybe this is called a meta-song? While here the song doesn’t explicitly comment on itself, it comments on other songs, and the songwriter’s world, which I would argue makes it just as ‘meta’. It breaks the song out the insulated world it would usually live in; existing on different levels of ‘real’. As far as I can tell this is the first song to ever do something like this; yet another boundary that The Beatles crossed. Literally ground breaking. (2)
It reflects John’s love of wordplay. He was a big fan of Lewis Carrol’s, who played with the boundaries of reality using words. It also exemplifies John’s tendency to write from a very personal and real place.
This sort of thing is quite rare even today in rock songs, I can’t think of any off the top of my head. But one genre that makes use of it very often is rap. In rap there is often no character in a song, there is only the rapper talking as themselves. The subject matter almost always makes reference to the rapper’s world and other songs/albums. The breakdown of boundaries between the real world and the song allows the rapper to boast about themselves specifically. For example:
“I drop that Black, Album then I back, out it,
As the best rapper alive ***** ask about me.”
Jay-Z ‘Dirt off Your Shoulder’
They’ll also sometimes speak directly to the listener:
“Look what you made me do, look what I made for you
Knew if I paid my dues, how will they pay you
When you first come in the game, they try to play you
Then you drop a couple of hits, look how they wave to you.”
Jay-Z – Encore (Interestingly enough…)
Sometimes they’ll comment on the current song itself;
“How u wanna do it? We can do it like we late ah wait dezzle let me get the 8 o 8
As I hit the kill switch
Now that’s how u let the beat build b*tch.”
Lil Wayne – Let the Beat Build
When you think about it, it’s impossible to picture a rap song not doing this. Most rap songs aren’t separate from the real world, they are usually the rapper talking as themselves, about themselves. The song exists in the rapper’s reality, and that allows them to brag, and do creative things like in the Lil Wayne example. Does this blending of song and reality trace its inspiration back to Glass Onion? Is Jay-Z talking about making “The Black Album” a result of John Lennon thinking freely enough to talk about making “Strawberry Fields”? We can’t establish a causal link, but it’s possible.
It also provides us with a glimpse of something I’ve always thought about. It’s a fundamental part of the genre for rappers to brag about their accomplishments, talent and innovation; imagine for a second what the Beatles would be able to brag if they had been so inclined.
We taught you how to backwards loop guitars,
And we introduced you motherfu*kers to sitars.
So you dropped a joint and it went platinum?
Check Sgt. Pepper’s, we invented the album.
Yikes, that didn’t come out as cool as I’d hoped, but you get the idea. Anyway my point is that hearing John coolly recollect that he told us about Strawberry Fields, may be the closest we’ll ever come to that. Maybe that’s for the better.
When you think about it, the approach taken in Glass Onion really is ground breaking, smashing the imaginary confines of reality a song usually lives in. No divide between the voice singing and the singer himself; talking directly to the listeners. The song not existing on its own in isolation, but aware of its membership, and commenting on other songs in the Beatle’s canon. Listen to it again, and hear John looking through the bent backed tulips.
Footnotes:
1 – So just to sum up. I argue that while this isn’t the first song in the first person to talk to another person, it is there first time where the first person character is specifically defined as being the real life singer of the song based on listing things that they’ve done in real life that only apply to them. (Not just saying I wrote you a song, but saying that he specifically wrote “Strawberry Fields”). And that this is the first time that has happened in conjunction with having an explicitly defined audience, by listing something he has done specifically to us in real life (previously telling us about Strawberry Fields).
2 – This probably wasn’t John’s ‘goal’ in writing this song, it may have been playful fodder for those trying to interpret The Beatle’s lyrics. But that concerns the content of the song. What we’re in interested in here is the form Lennon used to express that content.
Filed under: Roger | Tags: 789, Arnold, comedy, funny, guitar, jokes, life, mean, movie, Roger, stand up, theater, tickets
Shit, Roger saw his friend Arnold there waiting for him. Roger was a few minutes late, but there Arnold was, on time like always, probably because he knew that if he were even a few minutes late that would give people an excuse to leave. There he was standing in line at the cinema waving like an idiot once he saw Roger approaching. Roger raised his hand a bit and have him one of those facial shrugs you give to people you recognize in the hallways. At least they were seeing a movie, Roger had insisted on that; ten minutes of conversation before, then two hours of staring forward, and finally ten minutes after the movie before he’d tell Arnold he had to go water his plant. Of course that meant ten minutes of brain atrophy, listening to Arnold explain that he’d noticed one of the characters had had his shoelaces tied with a single knot in one scene only to have inexplicably appear double knotted in the next! And beforehand, well he knew what was coming beforehand. At least he was sure Arnold wouldn’t try to make conversation during the movie, he always paid close attention so that he could give the movie either a lauded ‘Arnie Aproves’ or the feared ‘Arnie Avoids’ in his Facebook status.
Now Arnold wasn’t a terrible guy. There were certainly worse people in the world. People who take their shoes off and massage their feet in public, people who get words shaved into their hair, people who turn every fucking phrase in an acronym, children and so on. It wasn’t like he was a murderer or something; unless you considered assisted suicide murder. He just had a very annoying habit that will definitely come to light in a few moments.
“Howdy Rog! Thought you weren’t coming” he said, putting away his cue cards, yep cue cards.
“Hey Arnold, sorry I’m late”, Roger said. ‘Still pleating your jeans eh’, he thought.
“Oh no problemo, how’s everything?”
“Not terrible, and you?”
“I’m just glad to do something fun for a change”. He said that the same way a character in a movie says something that is supposed to alert a person in a closet that it’s time to jump out.
Roger sighed, and went along with it. “Oh yeah, haven’t been doing many fun things lately?”
Arnold’s light up, he grinned and stood up straight. Then with a voice you use when you’re being videotaped he said “oh you know, the wife is always dragging me places. Baby showers, the ice-capades, the theatre, our wedding…”
Pretty funny right? The only thing was that Arnold was only 22 and definitely not married. It was another one of his bits that he thought of, probably while sitting on the can, and considered too funny to pass up so he used it, whether or not it applied to himself or the current situation. He’d been doing it for years, bits about his grand-children, his menstrual periods, how his first name rhymed with so many swear words, how awful it was to wear glasses (he didn’t) and so on. Talking to him was like having a conversation with joke a day toilet paper. The strangest part was that he didn’t consider it strange. He didn’t follow it up with a smile that said ‘hey I know I don’t have a wife, why the hell would I make that joke’. Nope, it was totally normal.
Arnold looked very pleased with himself subtly did one of those cocky head bobs from side to side. Roger usually tried to get onto the next subject as soon as possible after one of Arnold’s bits and just completely ignore it. How do you respond to something like that? “So this movie looks like it’ll be pretty good” Roger said extremely unenthusiastically.
“Oh yeah, that TV show said it’s great. But then again I don’t really care what the TV people say” said Roger, straightening up for another go at comedic excellence. “The man on the TV said it’s T-Shirt weather. I say I don’t let the TV pick my clothes, if I feel like wearing a vest I will”.
Roger nodded, looking around at all of the snow on the ground. “Mm hmm”. “How’s the new place?”
“Pretty swell. Just got a new cheese grater.”
“Nice.” “Good area?”
“Yep, right next to a bus stop.”
“Cool, yeah I hate having to walk a while to get to a bus stop.”
Roger looked around, then at the line, then at his watch. Arnold’s gaze didn’t shift from the movie poster in front of them, Roger could tell he was counting down the seconds in his head until he could tell another joke.
“Speaking of numbers” Arnold finally piped up; they weren’t. “Why was six afraid of seven?”
Roger knew this one, it wasn’t like Arnold not to use his own hand crafted material. “Because seven eight nine?” Roger said impatiently.
“No, because seven was a convicted serial killer”.
Roger nodded in acknowledgment, as it he’d just seen the right answer to a math problem. “Yeah I remember you were always good at math”, it didn’t make much sense, but that was the only thing Roger could think to say. Just then the doors to their theater opened and the line they were in started taking those small awkward penguin steps forward. Roger always liked to look at the people seeing the movie he was seeing, these were the people in his demographic, the people with the same interests as him; they all looked like idiots.
He tuned in to the people behind them and heard someone say, “I punch things to see how strong they are.” A few people ahead of them – ‘interesting how ‘people’ become a unit of distance when you’re in a line’ – two guys were debating which of their shoes were the ‘flyest’. Apparently one person’s were ’sik-wit-it’ while the other’s were more ‘club banging’ footwear. Enthralling.
“Spoken to any of the old fellas?” Arnold asked. By now they had almost reached the theater doors, he must have sensed that this was his last chance to fit in a bit before they got into the their seats.
“Mm yeah here and there, you?” Roger said. He pictured himself facing Arnold on a baseball diamond, tossing him a ball that Arnold who was waiting eagerly to hit it out of the park with a badminton racket.
“I hear Ian’s becoming one mean guitar player” Arnold said.
“Oh yeah, he’s getting good?” Roger asked distantly, even though he knew Ian had never touched a guitar.
“No he’s just a jack ass” Arnold said with a sheepish grin.
Without thinking about it Roger let out a burst of laughter and shook his head. “That’s pretty good” he said with a chuckle, looking at Arnold after one of his jokes for the first time.
Arnold looked a little embarrassed and but utterly content, as if Roger had been the only person to show up at his birthday party. He turned a little red and looked down, smiling, “thanks, I thought you’d like that one”.
They had approached the doors of the theater and were giving their tickets to the usher to be ripped. Roger patted his friend on the back as they walked in, “good to see you again Arnold”.
Filed under: Roger | Tags: awkward, bandits, declaration of independence, door, earphone, elevator, eye contact, fart, life, milk, sigh, walk, walked, walking
Shit, he saw someone coming towards him in his apartment hallway that he knew, or at least knew enough to know that he’d have to say hi, and that meant taking one of his carefully placed earphones out incase the other person said something important…’FUCK’. ‘It’s always so awkward to spot someone you know walking towards you, you never know when to make eye contact. You do it too early and you have to awkwardly look at each other while you’re too far away to talk. That’s like keeping eye contact with someone while they’re having a root canal.’ So he went through the process of pretending to inspect his immediate environment while staying aware of how close this other person was, ready to look up at exactly the right time. A few seconds of inspecting the wall later he looked up, made eye contact, smiled and said “hey”, or at least he meant to say hey. It was one of those times when you haven’t spoken for a while and when you do it comes out all screwed up. But it was alright, the other person offered up an equally inspired “how’s it going?”, a wonderfully rhetorical greeting. Maybe in time other questions will degrade to the point of rhetoricalness and instead of actually having a conversation people will just speak in disjointed rhetorical ponderings:
P1 How are you?
P2 How are the kids?
P1 Good Weekend?
P2 Great weather eh?
P1 Seeya later!
P2 Bye!
Well anyway, the greeting crisis having been handled expertly and the person having passed him by he lowered his smile a bit, but not all the way. He didn’t want to completely get rid of his smile after he’d passed the person, he wasn’t some kind of jackass. So he kept a grin on his face, as if that brief encounter had just ligthened his day, he felt consolation in the fact that his acquaintance probably looked equally moronic. He’d always been amused by that, how people say hi to one another and then keep smiling afterward, like they’d just read some clever joke. They always stand out, because no matter where you are in public, people look like they’re on their way to be turned into glue.
The elevator door opened and he got in, relieved to be in private once again, so relieved that he let out a big fart. ‘Shit, shit, shit; PLEASE don’t let the door open.’ What was it about farts that is so socially unacceptable anyway, just a normal bodily function, getting rid of waste gasses, people don’t get offended when you exhale. Was it the loud noise? ‘No you moron it’s the fact that they smell like shit.’ The elevator stopped. ‘Oh well, it’s been nice living here, been a great nine years’. He straightened up and tried to look as professional and classy as possible, like someone who would never fart. ‘What expression to wear…what kind of expression would someone who never farts have…probably like someone who is in a lot of pain. Should I pretend like I smell it too? Like I’m annoyed that someone had just farted in the elevator before I came in? No I’ll never pull that off… I’ll just try and look smart.’ He put his hand on his chin and tried to look like he was thinking about something.
An older lady walked in with a dog, he gave her the half-smile/nod, and went back to contemplating. After a few seconds she said “bandit!” Bandit? Was he a bandit for farting in an elevator? He looked over and saw that she was looking down at the dog, “sorry about that” she said.
“Oh, no problem!” he responded. ‘Phew!’, this day was looking up! Speaking of looking up, people in elevators look at those numbers like there’s a laser light show going on up there, ‘they’re not THAT interesting’. But he knew that people just looked at them because they thought that that would let them get to their floor, and out of that 5′ by 5′ chamber of awkwardness faster. ‘Really what do you talk about in an elevator? Ooh you can tell they greased those clamps! I’d rather watch the number show.’
They got to the bottom floor and the lady and Bandit got out first. He made eye contact with the two people waiting to get in and pointed at the dog with a disgruntled look on his face. The building having been navigated Roger opened the front door and let out a sigh. He put his previously perfectly placed earphone back in, and went out into the world to face whatever other disasters lay in wait.
Filed under: Etymologies
Highway Robbery: an outlandishly high price
This term originates from the early 1920’s when highways were still movable (1). In those days highways were set on large wheels and relocated to areas of need based on traffic (2). A problem arose when robbers began to literally ‘rob highways’, stealing them and moving them to remote hiding spots. Any cars left on the highway were looted and then sent on their way. The highways themselves were held for ransom; robbers were able to ask for considerable amounts of money as the highways were necessary for transportation to and from the emerging urban areas. The ridiculous size of these ransoms became associated with the term ‘highway robbery’ and soon any large price was compared to a ‘highway robbery’. The president at the time eventually solved the problem with the Federal Aid Highway Act, ingeniously creating highways that were affixed to the ground (3).
Footnotes:
1 – For this reason highways were not given names, only numbers, since they were not permanent. This tradition continues today.
2 – At times this would mean that other roads were blocked off by the newly placed road, leading to the term ‘roadblock’.
3 – The Act was famously argued for with the often misquoted line “It’s my way or the highway will be stolen”.
Filed under: Saga of the Tephritidae | Tags: bugs, fruit flies, insects, life, Tephritidae
It was the eve of the 6th day in July, they came out of nowhere; overrunning our borders in great number. The vile horde had the audacity to badger my kinsmen and me as we dined; telling tale and singing song of battles long gone.
The beasts of the manor had been disturbed for many moons, their warning I should have heeded. Without sound the tephritidae were upon us, but these were only scouts, sent to inform us of their presence. They received no mercy, and were slain with the might of a thousand suns, their blood stained the dining hall. Though the battle was won, I knew there would be more strife to come; they move in great numbers, breeding their fiendish kin quickly.
I consulted the oracle ‘Oogle, and learned of spells that my ancestors had once used to vanquish this host. They had made the first move, declared war, it was time to answer their call.
The kingdom was swept for any alleys the loathsome creatures might use as shelter. Traps enchanted by the oracle were hidden throughout the land. The borders of the kingdom were closed; their reinforcements would not arrive. Hunters were sent out and told to take no prisoners.
You are a worthy foe, horde of Tephritidae, but you will not live to rue the day you entered this kingdom.
Filed under: Etymologies | Tags: beauty tips, big wigs, Etymologies, hair, straw, wigs, words
Bigwig: an important or influential person; someone of a high status
Origin:
The term bigwig originated in the 17th century, when the short lived fad of wig-wearing (1) was at its peak. It became fashionable for people to shave their heads (2) and replace their hair with wigs; in this way they could sport a style they might not be able to naturally grow. It was seen as a triumph of man’s ingenuity over nature. However hair to make up these wigs was quite rare and expensive. Hair was sold by the strand and it was not uncommon for the lower classes to be seen wearing wigs consisting of only several strands of hair. The rich folk on the other hand were able to purchase large wigs made up of thousands of strands of hair and very soon the term ‘bigwig’ became associated with the very wealthy. This fad faded away as quickly as it had come with the advent of the top hat, however it lives on in the large ceremonial wigs seen in the British courts.
Footnotes:
1 – “Wig” is actually a slang term, which originated as a sarcastic name for early proto-wigs which were made of straw, and looked very similar to wigs made of twigs.
2 – The term ‘buzz cut’ for a shaved head has its origins here. People would have to shave their heads in order to wear wigs, and since this was the popular thing to do at the time it was called the ‘buzz’ cut.
© 2009 – davidsidhu.wordpress.com
Filed under: Odd | Tags: 1+1+1, 21.3 Seconds, 3, Alphabetical Order, astrology, books, Cargo Pants, eating, Finger Nails, Guns N' Roses, iPod, life, non-sequiters, Oasis, Plato, Shoelaces, Star Wars, The Beatles, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Three, Toronto Raptors, Zordon
I did this on my Facebook page, but thought I’d post it here too so that I’d be a bit more original, after all EVERYONE posts it on their Facebook page. I have to admit I’d already used two of the things I put there on this blog (blech I hate that word… hmm what about online journal? no that makes me sound too full of myself. maybe repository of genius combinations of words? yeah that’s nice) before, so I changed them. Think of this as the UK version!
1a) I tell time by drawing a line on my fingernail in the morning and just seeing how much it has moved.
1b) I’m convinced that our entire lives are divided into 21.3 second bits and that we experience them in a random order, but we think we just experienced the one that chronologically came before.
1j) I find it funny how we all stick to this arbitrary ‘alphabetical order’, and how much it affects our lives.
1d) I think cargo pants look stupid.
1e) I bleed Raptors red, I guess like most people…
1f) I think that people who were taught to tie their shoelaces with one bunny ear will develop entirely different personalities than those who were taught with two.
1g) I would have rather they’d picked a talented young female actress, like the girl from Miss Sunshine, to play Anakin in Episode I, and have the character go through a sex change than to be forced to endure that little shit they chose. Then again the dialogue was a pile too. I think you could write a better script by just channel surfing for two hours, changing the channel every few seconds, and writing down whatever disjointed dialogue you hear: infomercials, rap videos, whatever.
1h) I think it’s gross that the low points in famous people’s lives become entertainment in the form of tabloids for the masses to gawk at.
1i) I learned most of my morals from Zordon.
1c) I like when form matches content.
1k) I do things in sets of three.
1l) My four favourite songs (At the moment! It’s so hard to choose four, if I picked them in an hour from now I’d probably change a couple of them, these are just the ones that come to mind.) from my four favourite bands are, in alphabetical order:
A Day in the Life
Because
Breakdown
Can’t Stop
Civil War
Death of a Martian
Don’t Forget Me
Fade In-Out
Gas Panic!
Happiness is a Warm Gun
I’m Outta Time
I’ve Got a Feeling
Mr. Brownstone
Paradise City
Turn Up the Sun
Wet Sand
1m) I usually do things in sets of three.
1n) I find eating REALLY boring, actually I just ate, I had chicken and rice, but I digest – err digress.
1o) I’ve watched pretty much every episode of every season of Survivor, I think that’s why I’m so tall.
1p) I like non-sequiturs.
1q) Sometimes I look at the stacks of books in a library, and find it utterly amazing that such a small amount of matter contains mountains and mountains of ideas and thoughts. That the thoughts they generate and that they contain, which would look gargantuan if we could physically see the realm of ideas, are contained in such a little objects. Almost like the books are small mushrooms and the ideas they’re linked to are the networks of roots connected to them underground.
1r) I’d like to leave about a millimeter uncut in the middle of my fingernails all year, so that eventually I’d get these foot long, one millimeter wide claws. I think girls would find that attractive.
1s) I think grocery stores should have an aisle of food for thought.
1t) I think that astrology could be pretty accurate if every person in the world had their own sign, and their characteristics were based on psychological tests.
1u) When I listen to my iPod I usually drum along with my teeth; when I’m eating, it makes music edible!
1v) It would be nice to be reincarnated as a string on Jimi Hendrix’s guitar.
1w) When I get that first single seat on the bus, I know it’s going to be a good day. Also when I see the letter B instead of A after the numbers 1-9-6, I feel like I’ve just won the lottery.
1x) I love it when what a subway musician is singing/playing fits in perfectly with what you’ve listening to on your iPod.
1y) “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” – Plato,
Filed under: Music
This is really nothing more than a way to kill some time until I get some indication that I might be able to fall asleep soon.
I’m going to use a random word generator to generate seven random adjectives, and then come up with the song from my iPod that that word best fits. Not necessarily because that word describes that song, but that the impression I get when I hear that word fits what I get when I hear that song, usually not to do with the lyrics. Really something that I could do and write down on a scrap piece of paper but this makes it seem like it’s not a total waste of time. I’m not going to skip any random word. Unfortunately enough I started this last night and it’s still applicable tonight. : (
Random Adjective #1: Antique
What I see when I hear that word: an old photo in sepia of old objects in an attic.
Random Adjective #2: Living
What I see when I hear that word: a very green forest.
Random Adjective #3: Evil
What I see when I hear that word: dark, nauseatingly decrepit creatures.
Random Adjective #4: Done
What I see when I hear that word: a smooth edge.
Random Adjective #5: Alert
What I see when I hear that word: a red heart rate monitor going crazy.
Random Adjective #6: Attached
What I see when I hear that word: two old rusted pieces of metal that are frozen in a position gripping one another.
Random Adjective #7: Instructed
What I see when I hear that word: those toys that have a bunch of tiny pieces of metal that all stand up as you pass a big magnet over them.
