Why I Hate the Song, “Birdhouse in Your Soul”
Some people listen to music while they ride. I never do. When I’m on the bike, I like to hear what’s going on around me, and I like to let my thoughts wander.
Mostly, this is fine. My mind bounces from one topic to the next, sometimes landing on a funny or interesting thought, or occasionally suddenly solving what I had previously thought was an unsolvable dilemma.
Once in a while, though, my mind gets stuck on something. On the way in to work Friday, for example, I found myself — for no reason I can think of — mentally chanting the list of common linking verbs a teacher had taught my class back in fifth grade.
I didn’t want it in my head. I tried to get it out of my head. But it wouldn’t leave. To make things worse, I couldn’t remember the whole chant. Just that one part. So while part of me was trying to get the stupid thing out of my head, another part of me was trying to puzzle out how the rest of the chant went.
Luckily, my ride to work isn’t that long, and the chant is now out of my head. Or at least it was, until I started writing about it.
Scar Tissue
Everyone gets songs (or, more rarely, chants about grammar) stuck in their head from time to time, but cyclists are especially prone to them. The rhythm of the cycling cadence, along with steady, fast breathing, lends itself to looping a song through your head, over and over.
It’s not always bad. I remember that for one of the laps of 24 Hours of Moab one year, Red Hot Chili Pepper’s “Scar Tissue” ran through my head continuously. Since Californication is in fact one of my favorite albums of all time, I was OK with this particular song auto-repeating in my brain, and even sang snippets of it out loud (causing concern among riders as they passed me or (less often) were passed by me). I hit the words at the end of lines with an extra-hard exhale:
Soft spoken with a broken jaw
Step outside but not to brawl
Autumn’s sweet we call it fall
I’ll make it to the moon if I have to crawl
To tell the truth, I would have preferred “Parallel Universe,” my favorite song from the album; it’s got a base line that forces a fast cadence. But one of the rules of endless-loop music seems to be that you don’t get to pick the song.
Alas.
Birdhouse in Your Soul
This repetitive song phenomenon is no big deal, usually. Sometime soon after the ride ends, the song fades and you get on with your life.
If you’re on an endurance ride, though, an endless-loop song can become downright evil.
Several years ago, Dug, Racer and I drove to Laramie, Wyoming for what would turn out to be the final Laramie Range Enduro (that was a good course, rest its soul). As we parked the car and unloaded our bikes, They Might Be Giants’ “Birdhouse in Your Soul” came on the radio. Not paying much attention to it, I finished unloading my bike and lined up at the start.
About twenty minutes into the first climb of the race, the song came back to me. The problem was, I didn’t know the lyrics to anything but part of one verse and the chorus, and was even sort of sketchy on that. So I’m singing:
There’s a something something of me
Of my primitive ancestry
Who stood on something and kept the something shipwreck free
Though I respect that a lot
I’d be fired if that were my job
After killing Jason off and countless screaming argonauts
Something something something
Something it’s always near
Look at a canary over by the lightswitch
Who’s watching over you
Build a little birdhouse in your soul
Not to put too fine a point on it
Say I’m the only bee in your bonnet
Build a little birdhouse in your soul
And while you’re at it
Keep the nightlight on inside the
Birdhouse in your soul
Even taking the “something somethings” into account, I could tell I was getting it wrong — I couldn’t get the words to fit the meter. And the more I sang it, the worse it got, until I could no longer be sure I was getting the lines even remotely close to the right order.
And still it played on. For five hours.
After a while, I started looking for a suitable cliff to ride off, so I could end that infernal song. I imagined the conversation other racers would have as they saw me go over:
Racer 1: That guy just rode straight off a cliff! On purpose!
Racer 2: Did you notice the insane grin on his face?
Racer 3: More importantly, why was he singing that “Birdhouse in Your Soul” song as he went over?
Racer 1: I don’t know, but he was getting the lyrics all wrong.
I had a really fast time at that race, but took no pleasure in it. My dominant memory of that day is of that song, playing over and over and over.
And over.
I will hate that song forever.
It Gets Worse
As long as you don’t have children, you can at least take comfort in the fact that it’s your music that’s getting stuck in your head. Once you have kids, though, it’s a whole new ballgame. For example, my wife, in a fit of temporary insanity, purchased the animated video, “The Princess and the Pauper.” That would be awful enough, but the DVD comes with a bonus soundtrack CD. Which, of course, the girls want to be played in the car CD player. Always. And since there are only seven songs on that CD, you get to hear each of them quite frequently.
So: if I ride my bike head-on into traffic someday in the near future, you know why: I was doing whatever it took to get “You’re Just Like Me” out of my head.
PS: Today’s weight is 171.2. So my goal for the rest of this week is to undo the damage I did last weekend — get back to 169.0 — and then not hoover up every particle of food in sight in a 72-hour eating binge this upcoming weekend.
Comment by Zed | 02.14.2006 | 4:52 pm
Okay, so this could be a completely different race, but there’s a Laramie Enduro still running. Here’s the link: http://www.laramieenduro.org/
And it looks like there’s a 2006 edition.
For the record, ‘Scar Tissue’ is probably my favorite Red Hot Chili Peppers song. Yep, it’s in my car’s CD player right now, and I will be listening to it at lunch.
Comment by uncadan8 | 02.14.2006 | 4:53 pm
Anytime this topic comes up, I instantly get the Beatles’ "Yellow Submarine" going around in my head. Thanks a lot!
Comment by Tyler | 02.14.2006 | 5:05 pm
This is why I got rid of my TV.
For me, it’s bloody commercials from my childhood.
I still randomly here "Shoe ‘em you’re a tiger, show ‘em what you can do."Because the taste of Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes, they’ll put the tiger in you.
And you.
Comment by Big Guy on a Bicycle | 02.14.2006 | 5:07 pm
Actually, I like that song, though possibly not if it was running through my head constantly (like it will for the rest of the day now – thanks a lot).
"There’s a picture opposite me
of my primitive ancestry
who stood on rocky shores and kept the beaches shipwreck free"
et cetera, et cetera, ad infinitum
Comment by Dorene | 02.14.2006 | 5:30 pm
This phenomena actually has a name…it’s called an earworm.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earworm
A friend and I battle to implant annoying earworms into each others minds. This sport can get quite ugly at times. I mean, why else would you call someone up and sing "On the day that you were born, the angels got together…"???
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 5:42 pm
Thank you Fatty, for that. I now have James Brown’s "I Feel Good," stuck in my head, and all of the infernal memories associated with it, as it is the song that best matches endurance ride cadence for me. Ever hellish experience on my bike has been accompanied by funky Mr. Brown and his marginal music.
I am trying to replace him with Johnny Cash’s "Get A Rythm." Old habits die hard.
Just wait until you get "Ariel’s Theme" from A Little Mermaid stuck in your head, or "The Campfire Girls" theme song. Earworm, indeed.
Comment by Zed | 02.14.2006 | 5:50 pm
Oh, and for the record, ‘Wishlist’ by Pearl Jam is probably my number-one earworm.
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 6:07 pm
fatty, you’re looking at it all wrong. they might be giants are the reason you finished so well that day. you should be thanking them, not publicly excoriating them.
caloi, if i could keep wishlist in my head, i would always have a good ride. or a good anything. can’t think of a better earworm. it takes an earworm and makes it all cuddly and useful.
if you have kids, and your kids are stupid and mindless like mine, and have stupid parents like mine, and used to watch all the stupid mindless sequels to the land before time like mine, each with exactly 5 stupid and mindless (and tuneless) songs, then you know how to administer a home school lobotomy like me.
the horror. the horror.
Comment by allan | 02.14.2006 | 6:44 pm
I did the entire Off-Road Assault on Mt. Mitchell with The Killers "Somebody Told Me" going through my head. Unfortunately, I only knew the chorus. I had that 30-45 second loopof song going over and over for * hours. I almost threw that CD away after I finished.
Comment by allan | 02.14.2006 | 6:45 pm
OOps. That’s supposed to be 8 hours. Sorry about that.
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 7:06 pm
earworms – Beyond Belief by Elvis Costello, Foxtrot-Uniform-Charlie-Kilo by the Bloodhound Gang ( nasty AND annoying !), and Crunchy by ZZ Top.
What I realy hate is people that get the words wrong. My little brother used to sing Humphrey The Camel alot when we were kids, and just murdered the lyrics. I still haven’t totally forgiven him.
Comment by BIg Mike In Oz | 02.14.2006 | 7:35 pm
I often get Another One Bites The Dust by Queen going around in my head. Not comforting while riding on a busy road. Not comforting riding anywhere really. But not surprising since the permanent announcer at the biggest velodrome venue in our state thought he was a DJ. For about 2 years, whenever there was a fall he would crank out the chorus over the PA. I heard it a lot, and it often referred to me.
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 8:00 pm
Gah! I did a mtn. bike race, the Finley Hills Challenge (in SE Wa.) back in 1999 and had Cher’s "Do you believe in life after love" stuck in my head for the whole race. I couldn’t stand it and was telling myself to shut up and think of any other song, purposely singing other songs out loud all while Cher is droning on in the background. And now thanks to you it’s in my head right now. I don’t like Cher or her music and had only heard that song a few times prior to that day. My wife thought it was extremely funny that that song was stuck in my and still, to this day, will start singing it anytime I tell her I have a song stuck in my head. I’m pretty sure there have been divorces over less acts of meanness and cruelty. Thanks dear.
I did that same race in 1997 and had Would by Alice in Chains on contiuous repeat. I won that race. It was a very good day.
And for some reason after I ate a package of cookies, a couple of bowls of ice cream, and big plate of nachos in between my meals this past weekend I gained two pounds. 170 (again) Back to gum and water.
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 8:03 pm
Gah! I did a mtn. bike race, the Finley Hills Challenge (in SE Wa.) back in 1999 and had Cher’s "Do you believe in life after love" stuck in my head for the whole race. I couldn’t stand it and was telling myself to shut up and think of any other song, purposely singing other songs out loud all while Cher is droning on in the background. And now thanks to you it’s in my head right now. I don’t like Cher or her music and had only heard that song a few times prior to that day. My wife thought it was extremely funny that that song was stuck in my and still, to this day, will start singing it anytime I tell her I have a song stuck in my head. I’m pretty sure there have been divorces over less acts of meanness and cruelty. Thanks dear.
I did that same race in 1997 and had Would by Alice in Chains on contiuous repeat. I won that race. It was a very good day.
And for some reason after I ate a package of cookies, a couple of bowls of ice cream, and big plate of nachos in between my meals this past weekend I gained two pounds. 170 (again) Back to gum and water.
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 8:04 pm
Oops, double clicked
dj
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 8:13 pm
1995 mt bike race on Antelope Island. Spin Doctors Shinbone Alley/Hard to exist. Worst ever.
You know how you get food aversions after you eat something that makes you sick. Like when you eat a bunch of sausage, and then you get food poisoning and then you can’t even think about sausage for like a year, or for ever.
I think that day was the last time I ever listened to that album.
Botched
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 8:30 pm
I’m both helped and plagued by a number of earworms. Lately, there was a confluence between a Rocky earworm comment and a spin class extended effort "climb" interval. The common link was James Brown’s "I feel good." I’m now afraid to get back on the bike and do hill intervals, for fear of what awaits me. No, I don’t feel good on hills. My normal earworms:
Ted Nugent, Stranglehold. Great earworm on hills, steady cadence of about 80, usually good for an HR of about 170. Awful if it his on the flats and you’re trying to spin. On occasion The Nuge’s Free for All gets stuck in my head and that works too. I need to get that on my MP3 player now that I think about it – that’d be awesome for keeping a good cadence on this 40k TT I have coming up. None of Nugent’s stuff is good, however, if you’re trying to keep it in zone three. It’s zone 2, 4, or nothin’ baby.
Beastie Boys – SureShot. "Oh yes indeed it’s a fun time, fun time, Because you cant, and you wont, and you dont stop, yes you can’t, and you wont, and you don’t stop… " Man, that’s good motivating stuff on a hill, or on a long flat if you’re trying to keep the spin at 100 RPM. It’s also frequently trapped in my head after I ride. It’s not good with post-ride espresso.
REM, Driver Eight. Or Cuyahoga. Don’t know why. They aren’t that catchy. I guess my brain is just that low powered that nearly any bad idea can get caught in there.
Oh, and a piece of earworm advice. Only another earworm can drive an earworm out of your head. You need to find a powerful earworm you like, and if you get stuck with one you don’t like, try to get the one you like going – good post ride picks include Jimmy Buffet (e.g. "It’s my own fault") or Van Morrison (e.g. "Brown Eyed Girl"). But be very careful with this technique, however. An inexperienced worm handler can inadvertantly allow two more or less equally matched earworms to mate, resulting in a pernicious earworm that totally warps the senses, leading you to inadvertantly sing lyrics to the wrong tune. Rock anthems and toddler-level children’s versions of pop songs are particularly prone to mating. Be careful here – you don’t want to wind up singing the lyrics to "Godzilla" to the tune of "Achey-Breaky Heart." That’d be really embarassing, even among a crowd of snot rocketing men with shaved legs in tights.
Well, unless you’re a fan of Hayseed Dixie of course.
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 8:44 pm
Blue canary in the outlet by the lightswitch
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 8:57 pm
By the way, They might be Giants has an album that my kids love, "No!"
Their favorite song repeats "speck of dust:" over and over. You will love
it for the rest of your short life. I do.
Maybe I’ll start a band called They Should be Treks.
Comment by Unknown | 02.14.2006 | 9:10 pm
"Flinstones, meet the Flinstones, they’re a modern stone age fa-mi-ly…."
Two days of it. OMG…
Comment by rich | 02.14.2006 | 9:12 pm
Whether I bring my ipod along or not I always hear Metallica. Sad but true.
Comment by Fat Cyclist | 02.14.2006 | 9:35 pm
caloi – the current laramie enduro is a cousin to the original, but on a different course. i’d still want to ride it, if i were anywhere nearby. and i’m very happy to know you agree that Californication is great. what an album.
uncadan8 – part of you must hate yourself very badly to make you listen to the worst song the beatles ever made.
argentius – oh, you should get a new television. television is great now. there’s no crap at all in the programming, and none of the ads are annoying anymore. i promise!
bgoab – i used to like that song, too, UNTIL I PLAYED AND PARSED IT IN MY HEAD TO THE POINT I WANTED TO JAB OUT MY EYES.
waywardsailorgal – earworm is a great name for it, because it conjures up an image of an evil parasite burrowning into your brain, like in Star Trek: Wrath of Khan.
rocky – to hear the song, "i feel good" endlessly while one is feeling especially bad is a deliciously ironic form of self-torture. i congratulate you on your subliminal choice.
dug – land before time videos are evil in so many ways, but the worst is the way that pterodactyl thing talked, using bad grammar: "me no like eating poison!" before long your kids are imitating that speech style, and then you’re forced to duct tape their mouths shut.
allan – 8 hours with the killers? and yet you remain lucid. you are a strong man.
boz – sorry, i’m one of the guys who gets the words wrong. and the longer i have the earworm, the wronger i get the words. we’re not doing it on purpose, i swear.
big mike – not that you have any choice in the matter, but if you COULD select a queen earworm, you’d probably want to choose Fat Bottomed Girls, or maybe Bicycle Race. two great songs for cyclists.
dj – cher? ooh, i pity you. and apologize for bringing up a very painful memory.
botched – how’d you get that song stuck in your head? i didn’t even know it exists. didn’t the spin doctors pretty much sing "two princes" and then retire? i know what you’re talking about with the food aversions. my wife felt fine for the first 20 minutes after her first chemo treatment (hey, maybe this won’t be so bad after all!), so we went to lunch at Quiznos. of course, 10 minutes later she became sick beyond the telling of it. she’ll never be able to set foot in a Quiznos again.
al – you can pick an earworm and make it stick? i’ve tried, and the conciously-selected one always loses to the subliminally-selected one. that said, if i could select an earworm, sureshot would be my second beastie-boys choice. first choice would be shadrach, meshach, abednego.
beakasaurus – we’ve got "NO!" and like it, except for that "Don’t cross the street in the middle of the middle of the middle of the middle of the middle of the block." talk about an earworm.
strap – man, they don’t make theme songs like they used to. flintstones is classic.
rich – you know, metallica will sue you for thinking about their songs if you don’t pay them a royalty.
Comment by Tom Stormcrowe | 02.14.2006 | 11:37 pm
Just be very happy you didn’t get the last song I had stuck in my head! "Stayin’ Alive" by the BeeGee’s! This is a fate worse than death! Thee are only two songs worse to get stuck! The "Barney" song and the "Macarena"!
Comment by Juliet | 02.15.2006 | 12:34 am
argentus – I have jingles in my head for days- trouble is I can never remember the product – advertisers don’t like people like me.
rich – Sandman?
fatty – freeze the chocolate chips – they are way harder to scarf down that way – without breaking your teeth that is.
Comment by Unknown | 02.15.2006 | 1:41 am
<p>Earworms of the week:</p>
<p>Lately it’s been old Toad the Wet Sprocket songs or "new" ones from Glen Phillips (from Toad). In particular, "Train Wreck" has been on nearly constant playback. Unfortunately I can’t remember all the verses, but the first verse is so catchy I can’t get it out of my head:</p>
<p>She looked just like a train wreck
That could’ve been avoided
In a third world country
By a long stretch of farmland
Where the waters had run high
And washed the topsoil down the river
So that next year there’d be no crops</p>
<p>I think not being able to have all the lyrics in your head is part of the pain of the earworm phenomenon!</p>
Comment by Unknown | 02.15.2006 | 2:15 am
Sorry this is so long. But Fatty asks how you can intentionally get one earworm to kill another. It’s not easy. The sad fact is, that earworm handling requires a deft touch, and you gots to have mad skillz before you try it. Let me explain.
You can’t do it directly. That is, you can’t just say, "oh, I have an earworm, I’ll have to come up with a more powerful earworm to kill off the first one." That doesn’t work, and in fact, the direct approach often leads to the tragic mating of the earworms. Ever seen a deranged guy climbing a hill, singing "Mmmmmbop" to the tune of "Old Man River"? It’s a terrible thing. Making a conscious effort to dispel earworms is a clumsy stupid Gaijin approach, and just what I’d expect of bicyclists unskilled in zen, Musashi, and the intricacies of Swiss banking.
Instead, use wisely the force, you must.
You need to learn to not think about elephants.
See? There you go. You just thought of an elephant when I said that. You have no subtlety. Obey directions, you cannot.
Hmm. This will be tough.
Okay, let me put it differently. You need to recognize your brain has been infested with an earworm, without consciously getting upset about it or focusing on it. Just let it play for a while. As it plays along, unsuspecting, you need to let a quiet little corner of your brain come up with an earworm with stronger juju. That Van Morrison Brown Eyed Girl is really good, the only caveat being it is among the most powerful of earworms going, especially when it can feed on a 35 – 45 year-old male brain. So you have to be careful or you can end up with a permanent infestation, which can be deadly if your blue-eyed wife catches you singing it in the shower, you’ve just lost 10 pounds, etc.
Anyhow, when you recognize a whisp of the new lyrics and tune to your new earworm, slowly start turning your focus towards it. Don’t think of elephants.
Dagnabbit. You just thought of elephants. I told you not to think of elephants, Grasshoppa. You need to work on your technique here. I’m telling you not to think of elephants because to properly handle earworms, you can’t do it on the highest functioning, most aware level of your brain. You must sublimate both the recognition that you’ve got a bad infestation of earworm, as well as your little plot to use a second earworm to kill the first. You need to be able to read the word "elephant" without picturing one. Likewise, you cannot directly think of earworms, and either get rid of one, or pick on up. It’s like the Ark of the Covenant in the Indiana Jones movies – you can’t look at it directly or bad things will happen. Elephants are the "wax on, wax off" of earworm removal technique. If you can read elephants and think of Mr. Miyagi rather than big grey things, you are going in the right direction.
Anyhow, don’t try to get rid of the first earworm. Just leave it alone while you make friendly with the second one. Get into the new one. Notice its fine annealing. "Hey, did you just mate, little earworm? Ahh, I see. The Dylan and Dead versions of Dancing in the Streets. Ooh, from their joint tour in ‘93. Buffalo. Wow. Sweet. I’ll be dancin’ in the streets, yeah, every guy grab a girl…" As your attention slowly turns toward the new earworm, the old one will be losing its grip.
At that point, you must prepare yourself for the final onslaught of the old earworm. It will no doubt get to the hook in its song, and it will try to make you think about the elephant. It will have an opening to do so because you lack my iron discipline, and you will be thinking of the elephant and pleased with yourself, that just like Uncle Al said, a new earworm is hopping on board.
"HEEEEEEYYY, MACARENA!!!!!
Yep, just let that old earworm make that last dying scream, and embrace the new one without trying to embrace it. If it’s a friendly earworm, like Bizet’s "Toreador" which can be driven away easily, embrace it fully. If it’s an unfriendly earworm, like Garth Brooks "Friends in Low Places," just accept that it’s not the solution to your misery, it’s merely a different kind of misery that will torment you on the last half of your double century. Which is a rotten thing to have to face, but still better than being stuck with the same single earworm for the entire ride.
HAAAAYYY, MACARENA!
Comment by TIMOTHY | 02.15.2006 | 3:11 am
I was starting to think that I was the only person that didn’t want an MP3 player jammed into my brain when I rode – even on an endurance ride! A ride, to my thinking, is not just being on my bike, it’s the whole experience – the sights, the smells, the taste of the air (or and sometimes that coppery taste that makes you wonder if tasting blood is a good thing or not…) the feel of the air moving over you, and yes, the SOUNDS! To eliminate one of those diminishes the experience. Even in the winter you can fell the air on your face….and on my road bike I like to be able to listen for cars when I come to an intersection (the cross streets on our designated "bike route" are uncontrolled…) and whatever SUV is about to kill me from behind.
To combat getting horrid songs stuck in my head I suggest the following: Make a CD that you can listen to just before the ride, like in the car for instance. Pick only great songs that you really like and that would make a good cadence on the bike (I like Cake’s "Going the Distance" and Black Crowes "Go Faster"), then be sure to learn all the words (check out http://www.songlyrics.com). That way you are always prepared to be able to sing something good if something crappy pops into your head and won’t let go.
Me, when I’m pushing a 30 mph headwind, always get the Barnum and Bailey’s circus music stuck in there….
Comment by Unknown | 02.15.2006 | 3:14 am
I too have suffered through more than my fair share of music from "Princess and the Pauper," both on and off the bike. If I ever catch the people who made that movie. I’m going to beat them senseless with a frame pump.
Comment by Jill | 02.15.2006 | 4:27 am
Yeah, I know this isn’t a contest for the worst. But what about songs that were intentionally written for that specific purpose? I used to watch the Lambchops show as a kid:
This is the song that dosen’t end,
Yes it goes on and on my friend.
Some people started singing it not knowing what it was,
and they’ll continuing singing it forever just because …
(ad infinitum)
Comment by delirium | 02.15.2006 | 5:36 am
Great blog. Been reading it for 6 months or so now. I’m a first time commenter. (cue first time sound effect)
Anyway, I am a sound engineer at a church and this week we are doing the Gwen Stefani song, "If I were a rich girl," so I’ve been listening to it alot lately. I did a 2 hour ride today and that’s the only thing going thru my head. It’s driving me nuts. I’ve never liked the song and I’m not a girl but I’m singing it while i’m riding. I think I need counseling.
Comment by Tyler | 02.15.2006 | 8:08 am
And the Other Question of the day is :
How does Al Maviva type so much in so short a time?
Step away from the third hand, man.
Comment by Bryn | 02.15.2006 | 8:33 am
I thought i was just wierd. I too used to get the linking verbs stuck
in my head. Especially when i played football, maybe it was the reason
i was never any good at football. The bad thing about it is that it
never ends, if it eventually ties back to the start then you just kepp
repeating it, if it doesn;t go back to the start you end up just trying
to figure out what comes next. Id love any song stuck in my head as
oppossed to that thing. come to think of it, i haven’t had it for a
couple of years now. Yay!
Comment by Unknown | 02.15.2006 | 9:49 am
Ahhh, Argentius… Don’t you mean the Gripping Hand?
Comment by Unknown | 02.15.2006 | 12:16 pm
Some things they don’t tell you about having kids
You will be driving your manly mates out to a trail. You stick the CD player on and start singing along. It takes a minute or two for you to realise you are singing nursery rhymes.
You turn the CD player off and continue in embarased silence. Then you start pointing things out, "Oh look cows!" "Sheep!"
If your manly mates are also parents, it can take quite a while before anyone realises what they are doing.
Cheers
TIm
Comment by Loes | 02.15.2006 | 3:57 pm
It’s been proven that the best way to get rid of an earworm is to finish the song in your head (instead of repeating the same parts over and over). You don’t need to know the lyrics, but just the melody.This doesn’t work for me though, I need to know the lyrics, but unfortunately I never know those. So usually I repeat the same sentence over and over again….really annoying. Or just the chorus.My way to get rid of earworms is to find a stronger earworm, that always works for me (worked when I tried to get the pokemon theme song out of my head).
Comment by Unknown | 02.16.2006 | 6:22 am
You gained two pounds in three days??? How is that even possible? Doesn’t that require about 10,000 excess calories? Creeping Chaos, I’ve never been able to gain two pounds in three months!
I’ve always thought the stuck-song thing involved oxygen deprivation or other brain-impairment. My worst cases were in hikes over 11,000 feet. While riding, maybe it’s low blood glucose.
mx
Comment by brad | 02.17.2006 | 12:33 am
do you know that "submarine" on the side of Issaquah-Hobart rode? well I was fine with it until they painted it yellow. I’ve had to change my riding routes.
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