Remember I said I was gonna do these link round-ups more often? Yeah, well, vacation blah blah blah whatever. I'm lazy and easily distracted, let's not sugar-coat it.
Similarly, you may have noticed the Monthly-Goal-Support-or-Whatever-We're-Going-to-Call-It Post went AWOL in April. Fear not, it will be back soon--this coming Monday I'm thinking. I want to find out how y'all are doing in your various pursuits.
So, in no particular order, and lacking any sort of coherent theme, here's some cool stuff you might want to check out 'round the web!
If you listen to music while you run (or any other time, but let's pretend this is a fitness post) you have probably encountered this phenomenon:
The song lyrics are difficult to make out, and sometimes the words you "hear" sound quite silly. But you rack your brain for alternatives and it still really sounds like those are the actual words! Later you discover what the real lyrics are, and of course your goofy version was totally wrong.
Cranky Fitness does not pretend to be the first to discover the humor in "mondegreens," or misheard song lyrics. Google a bit and you will find bazillions of hilarious examples.
However, does anyone else find it annoying that most of these collections are based on the premise that the listener actually thought the silly lyrics were the real ones?
Isn't it funny enough that the Creedence Clearwater lyrics "There's a Bad Moon on the Rise" sound so much like "There's a Bathroom on the Right" that you could almost swear that's what they were singing? Do sensible adults really have to pretend that they believed a song that hit Number 2 on the Billboard charts was written about the location of a restroom facility? Or that Jimmy Hendrix was asking his listeners, back in 1966, to "Excuse me while I kiss this guy?"
Seems more likely that people heard funny words and thought: "Doesn't it almost kinda sound like they're saying ______? Wouldn't it be funny if those were the actual lyrics?" Yet it remains a tradition that we act as though we once were certain the goofy lyrics were authentic.
(So I'll concede the "when I was seven years old I thought..." sort of stories are a lot more credible. I thought lots of silly things myself when I was a kid. But even some of these sound a little fake sometimes).
But let's put aside the question of whether these mishearings are truly misunderstandings. Some of the collections you come across from various sources (like here or here) really are quite amusing.
For example, do you remember any of these classic lyrics?
Madonna's: "Like a virgin, touched for the thirty-first time." (very first time);
Eurythmics: "It’s all right, babies come in bags" (Baby's comin' back);
Robert Palmer's: "Might as well face it you're a dick with a glove" (addicted to love);
Cher's: "Gypsies, Chimpanzees" (Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves);
Maria Muldaur's: "Midnight after you're wasted" (Midnight At the Oasis);
Joni Mitchell's : "A gay pair of guys put up a parking lot" (They paved paradise and put up a parking lot);
Or the Eagle's : "I'm looking for a lover who won't blow my brother, she's so hard to find." (my cover, not brother)
(Note: the "corrected" lyrics in parentheses may not be entirely right either, as I didn't bother to look 'em all up).
Alas, an effort to turn this into a more intellectual scholarly discussion of misheard song lyrics turned up nothing the least bit researchy. Well, except this totally incomprehensible study. (Seriously, I have no idea what the hell that was supposed to be about).
So what are some of my mishearings? Unfortunately, most of mine aren't that funny, or else they are entirely too common. For example, the Bee-Gees song "Bald-headed woman" came on at the gym the other day, but tons of us hear it that way, not as "More than a woman." Likewise, I'm not the only one who hears the Savage Garden tune "I Want You" as referencing a poultry-flavored soft drink, Chicken-Cherry Cola. I couldn't even figure out what the heck the real lyrics were.
I do have a tune on my iPod in which a woman enthusiastically implores her man to "Take Me To The Closet, Bub." However, she doesn't sound nearly sultry enough to be suggesting a furtive sexual encounter surrounded by coats and umbrellas, so I suspected those weren't the real lyrics. Yet even trying really hard to make sense of the words, it took weeks to finally hear them as "Take Me to The Clouds Above."
And there's a line in a song called "Poison" in which the singer is talking about how tempting having sex with her lover is:
"Your mouth, so hot; your ware, uncut; "Your skin, so wet; black lace, on sweat"
I guessed I was probably hearing that wrong--would she really comment on the fact that her boyfriend had an uncircumcised penis? And would she use the rather old-fashioned sounding "ware" as a euphemism? But it kept sounding like that's exactly what she was saying. I finally had to look it up online to find out that "your ware, uncut," was actually "your web, I'm caught."
Dang, I shouldn't have looked. I liked the uncircumcised version better.
So obviously I'm not very good at funny mishearings--I'm hoping you all can do much better--either ones you misheard yourselves, or other funny ones you've come across.
In the meantime, here's an amusing video, and you don't even have to like Pearl Jam to enjoy it.
[Re-run warning: Yep, sorry, this is another oldie. But I'll be back from vacation soon with more new posts!]
If you listen to music while you run (or any other time, but let's pretend this is a fitness post) you have probably encountered this phenomenon:
The song lyrics are difficult to hear, and sometimes the words you "hear" in fact sound quite silly. But you rack your brain for alternatives and it still really sounds like those are the actual words! Later you discover what the real lyrics are, and of course your goofy version was totally wrong.
Cranky Fitness does not pretend to be the first to discover the humor in "mondegreens," or misheard song lyrics. Google the phrase and you will find bazillions of hilarious examples.
However, does anyone else find it irritating that most of these collections are based on the premise that the listener actually thought the silly lyrics were the real ones?
Isn't it funny enough that the Creedence Clearwater lyrics "There's a Bad Moon on the Rise" sound so much like "There's a Bathroom on the Right" that you could almost swear that's what they were singing? Do sensible adults really have to pretend that they believed a song that hit Number 2 on the Billboard charts was written about the location of a restroom facility?
Or that Jimmy Hendrix was asking his listeners, back in 1966, to "Excuse me while I kiss this guy?"
Seems more likely that people heard funny words and thought: "Doesn't it almost kinda sound like they're saying ______? Wouldn't it be funny if those were the actual lyrics?" Yet it remains a tradition that we act as though we once were certain the goofy lyrics were authentic.
(So I'll concede the "when I was seven years old I thought..." sort of stories are a lot more credible. I thought lots of silly things myself when I was a kid. But even some of these sound a little fake sometimes).
But let's put aside the question of whether these mishearings are truly misunderstandings. Some of the collections you come across from various sources (like here or here) really are quite amusing.
For example, do you remember any of these classic lyrics?
Madonna's: "Like a virgin, touched for the thirty-first time." (very first time);
Eurythmics: "It’s all right, babies come in bags" (Baby's comin' back);
Robert Palmer's: "Might as well face it you're a dick with a glove" (addicted to love);
Cher's: "Gypsies, Chimpanzees" (Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves);
Maria Muldaur's: "Midnight after you're wasted" (Midnight At the Oasis);
Joni Mitchell's : "A gay pair of guys put up a parking lot" (They paved paradise and put up a parking lot);
Or the Eagle's : "I'm looking for a lover who won't blow my brother, she's so hard to find." (my cover, not brother)
(Note: the "corrected" lyrics in parentheses may not be entirely right either, as I didn't bother to look 'em all up).
Alas, an effort to turn this into a more intellectual scholarly discussion of misheard song lyrics turned up nothing the least bit researchy. Well, except this totally incomprehensible study. (Seriously, I have no idea what the hell that was supposed to be about).
So what are some of my mishearings? Unfortunately, most of mine aren't that funny, or else they are entirely too common. For example, the Bee-Gees song "Bald-headed woman" came on at the gym the other day, but tons of us hear it that way, not as "More than a woman." Likewise, I'm not the only one who hears the Savage Garden tune "I Want You" as referencing a poultry-flavored soft drink, Chicken-Cherry Cola. I couldn't even figure out what the heck the real lyrics were.
I do have a tune on my iPod in which a woman enthusiastically implores her man to "Take Me To The Closet, Bub." However, she doesn't sound nearly sultry enough to be suggesting a furtive sexual encounter surrounded by coats and umbrellas, so I suspected those weren't the real lyrics. Yet even trying really hard to make sense of the words, it took weeks to finally hear them as "Take Me to The Clouds Above."
And there's a line in a song called "Poison" in which the singer is talking about how tempting having sex with her lover is:
"Your mouth, so hot; your ware, uncut; "Your skin, so wet; black lace, on sweat"
I guessed I was probably hearing that wrong--would she really comment on the fact that her boyfriend had an uncircumcised penis? And would she use the rather old-fashioned sounding "ware" as a euphemism? But it kept sounding like that's exactly what she was saying. I finally had to look it up online to find out that "your ware, uncut," was actually "your web, I'm caught."
Dang, I shouldn't have looked. I liked the uncircumcised version better.
So obviously I'm not very good at funny mishearings--I'm hoping you all can do much better--either ones you misheard yourselves, or other funny ones you've come across.
In the meantime, here's an amusing video, and you don't even have to like Pearl Jam to enjoy it.
A couple weeks ago, I biked to the beach to go for a run. For several days, there'd been a large pod of rare Right whales just off the coast. And I was in luck, there were three of them just offshore! The beach was empty first thing in the morning and it was just me and three whales. I was psyched.
But then I reached into my pocket and discovered I'd forgotten my iPod. I nearly burst into tears.
My run was ruined.
(Sure, the whales helped--they were awesome. But I still spent most of my run sulking over the fact I had no music).
Hello, my name is Crabby McSlacker and I have an iTunes addiction. Are there any fellow addicts out there who can no longer do aerobic exercise without music?
Most of the time, it's not a problem. Like when I remember to bring the iPod and the battery is charged and I have a playlist full of good tunes, life is good. Exercise becomes far less of a chore--and is sometimes even fun.
However, due to my technological stupidity and a certain amount of Evilness lurking behind the cheerful exterior of the iTunes Empire, often things go wrong.
(Not everyone has problems. My current difficulties come from trying to move my iTunes library over and over--from laptop computer to desktop computer to new laptop computer to new external hard drive, etc. It also didn't help that I bought a new iPod, even though I had to to replace a satanic one that used to spontaneously change languages and play all sorts of other pranks.)
I had originally thought for this post I might put my whole exercise library of Eight Awesome Workout Playlists (sorted alphabeticially by song title, for maximum randomness) up on iMix for everyone to laugh at check out. I even managed to publish the first one, but it turned out crappy because I forgot to delete the songs off it that I didn't like myself. I set out to do a much better job on the next seven... and that's when iTunes turned stupid and mean.
It decided it couldn't find any of my songs anymore.
"Hey iTunes," I said, calmly, "the songs you are looking for are are right here. Remember? I told you I moved them to an external drive. Recognize them, please? There are 300 songs and I paid you for all of them."
"Songs? What songs? I see nothing but exclamation marks."
"Right here! You knew where they were five minutes ago, and I haven't moved them!"
"Songs? Nope. Sorry! Can't find 'em anymore. But hey, if you need tunes so bad, you can always get your butt over to our iTunes store and buy 300 more."
When it's Crabby vs iTunes, it's not an even match.
So half a day and many attempts at fixes later, I still can't get the library working again--which means I can still play things off my own iPod, but I can't share playlists.
Which is just as well because you'd hate the songs. Other people's favorite workout music always seems surprisingly sucky.
So I have to apologize again to all the googlers who come to Cranky Fitness looking for "workout music" or "exercise iTunes playlists" or "best iPod cardio tunes" or "aerobic iTunes suggestions" or whatever--and just get a lecture on how everyone has different tastes so go look somewhere else.
One way to do it: go to iTunes or your own favorite retailer, and search people's shared playlists until you find music that doesn't make you barf.
At iTunes, you can go to the regular iMix section and search for "cardio" or "spinning" or "aerobic" etc. There is also now a special section called Nike Sports Mixes. It's not just corporate stuff, there's a section that includes workout iMixes made up by real people--real people who know how to get to their own music libraries and share playlists.
Does anyone else have a love/hate relationship with their exercise music technology? Or any awesome suggestions for workout music we can disagree over?
(Note: For alert readers who noticed that today's post was exceptionally lame, there's a reason: the Crab and Lobster have house guests this week. Crabby's posts should return to the more accustomed level of lameness next week. There may or not be Time Off involved--we'll see. Thank God for Merry and for patient readers!)
