They say laughter is the best medicine. So when I laugh at people, I’m just looking out for my health.
One of many reasons I’ll be in hell if it exists is laughing at an impassioned speaker during high school who said, “we will no longer take your condensation!” Expressing frustration with condescension but messing up the word…now that’s ironic, Alanis. To this day, when I want to feign indignation, I say: “I will take your sublimation, I will suffer through your precipitation, but by God, I will no longer stand for your condensation.”
So I’m a pain in the ass. But lest ye think I have no embarrassing moments of stupidity, I’m here to invite you to laugh at me.
Most of my highlights are the result of being naive. I have lived a pretty sheltered life. Although I’ve always had a mouth like a sewer, that came from growing up around my older brother and his friends, not the result of experience. I was, and sometimes still am, an innocent Catholic school girl at heart.
Sophomore year of high school, I was startled at the change in appearance of one of our classmates. I turned to my friend and whispered, “Wow, she really got fat!” And my friend looked at me incredulously and said, “She’s pregnant!” I can’t remember if she added, “you moron,” but if not, I deserved it. I was still a little confused even after the explanation (uh, isn’t sex required to get pregnant?!?), but managed to hold it in.
My specialty is misinterpreting song lyrics.
Sometimes I take things too literally. I’m embarrassed to report it was only a few years ago I finally realized “Santa Claus” was actually Daddy dressed up as Santa Claus in the song “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus.” Before that, I had always just thought Mommy was a slut.
One of my favorite songs ever is “Mama Said Knock You Out,” by L.L. Cool J. It came out during my senior year of high school, when I was immersed in English literature (immersed as in having to memorize some of the prologue of The Canterbury Tales in Middle English). So when L.L. said, “Old English filled my mind, and I came up with a funky rhyme,” I was terribly impressed at such an allusion in a rap song.
Because clearly L.L. Cool J meant this Old English:
Of course, I learned later about an alternative “Olde English.” Perhaps this is the origin of the funky rhyme?
I still prefer to believe it’s a double entendre.
For all I know, the line might have been a triple entendre…
I could have swiped stock photos, but I am committed to my craft. Beowulf came from the library (buy it? bitch, please!), furniture polish from the grocery store, and the malt liquor…let’s say finding Olde English 800 in my neck of the woods was not as easy. We’d pretty much given up when we happened upon a little corner store with “wine and beer” in the title. On the way in, I had a premonition that our purchase of Olde English 800 would not go without comment. The guy behind us didn’t disappoint: “OE 800?!?! Kickin’ it old school like Dr. Dre!”
Nope, taking a picture of it for my blog. Dave’s excited to take it to his next band practice. He insisted I put it back in the fridge as soon I was finished taking photos so it wouldn’t be exposed to light. Something about degrading the quality…ahem. “Sweetie, I put the 40 of OE 800 next to your imported Belgian Trappist Ale.”
What’s your best moment of ignorance?
dayum…you’re taking this itti bitti blogin world by storm, and yer jus gettin warm!
I’ve been laughing at the ignorance surroudning the contraception debate and the firestorm around humorless Sandra Fluke and vile Rush Limbaugh. I’m convinced there are a lot of people who need to be drunk and having sex. Maybe Olde English 800 large is the answer to a lot of this country’s problems.
epic post. One of my favorites in quite a while. Imagine how much more entertaining Canterbury Tales would be if malt liquor was involved. Don;t get me started of the Bard of Avon’s material….
I’m blastin, outlastin
Kinda like Shaft, so u could say I’m shaftin
All the bloggers in the top ten, please allow me to bump thee.
And also, what made you forget that I was raw?
I think someone needs to run on a “more drunken sex” platform.
Judging by the unfortunate color, I don’t think I’d enjoy Olde English 800 malt liquor beverage any more than I enjoyed reading Beowulf or the Canterbury Tales (which wasn’t much).
I wonder if Thomas Malory ever got busy in a Ye Olde Burger King bathroom?
I don’t know, was he Samoan?
Love it! I recently had an experience with a song similar to your “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” moment, but it eludes me right now. If I remember it I’ll post a follow up.
Scott, please do update me if you remember. I love this stuff.
Misheard lyrics are always fun too. I’ll never forget Mark Goodman saying Sting changed the words of “Driven to Tears” for Live Aid to “too many cameras and not enough food” during MTV’s coverage. Moron. I still have no idea what Mark thought the original lyrics could have been–not enough film??? Lord knows I’d never make such a mistake!!!
Loved this post and totally get the committment to find all the items for the pic! And the title alone had me laughing!
You would not believe the care I took in setting up photos of malt liquor. I am nuts.
🙂
This had me cracking up! LOVED, LOVED the triple entendre. That was awesome. So glad you linked this up to #findingthefunny!
Thanks, Kelley! Beowulf goes back to the library and Dave already consumed the malt liquor, but I’ve decided I have no use for the furniture polish…it left a weird streaky film on my wood surfaces. And the scent filled my mind in a bad way (no funky rhyme).
“I will take your sublimation, I will suffer through your precipitation, but by God, I will no longer stand for your condensation.” Completely classic!! This post really made me laugh. I am still trying to figure out the lyrics to Blinded by the Light – “Wrapped up like a douche”???
Douche, I know! What’s crazy about that, is that EVERY time I hear that song, the lyrics drive me so crazy that I bother to look up them up…and then because the real lyrics make no sense to me, I promptly forget them. Then the next time I hear the song, I have to look it up again. Just looked it up again and he’s saying “revved up like a deuce,” which has no meaning to me so I can never remember it. I guess a deuce is a car reference. Next time, I’ll still think it’s douche. Other things I learned: the douche version is a cover of a Bruce Springsteen song and they changed that line and ended up making it sound more douchey. I bet Bruce was thrilled.
Believe it or not, Blinded by the Light is Bruce’s only #1 song, and it was the Manfred Mann version that got there. Bruce says it got to #1 only because of the alleged “douche” line.
Not a fan of Bruce, but I can’t believe he doesn’t have a number 1 song other than the douche cover version. I’ve now had this song stuck in my head for two days and want to kill myself.
That’s hilarious. I don’t think I ever listened to the words of that song. Now “Around the Way Girl” I did…and I thought bamboo earrings were really made of bamboo from some third world nation.
I have trouble looking at bamboo earrings, they look so heavy and uncomfortable, like they will rip the person’s earlobe in two. It would be better if they were made of actual bamboo (gold plated, of course).
I’m not sure this is what I was thinking of back when I originally commented on this, but I just remembered one of my longstanding misheard lyrics.
In the Huey Lewis and the News song “The Heart of Rock and Roll,” there’s a line that goes “Now the old boy may be barely breathing, but the heart of rock and roll is still beating.”
From the first time I heard the song when it was released when I was about 10, until maybe a year ago, I was convinced it was “Now the OBOE may be barely breathing.”
I’m touched that you remembered this post and came back to share a misheard lyric. I never knew exactly what he was saying in that line. I thought it was something like “knock me over now I’m barely breathing,” but that doesn’t make any sense either. Although I’d argue it makes more sense than an oboe barely breathing. I also want to say thanks for planting this song into my head. Ugh.
Apparently “Old English” is also a sharp spreadable cheese product made by Kraft. http://www.amazon.com/Kraft-English-Cheese-Spread-5-Ounce/dp/B005DDC4XK
Elizabeth, thanks for this link. I can’t get the imagined taste of that cheese spread out of my mouth. I bet it tastes very orange.