The Ryno Pen

Firstly, a silly sketchy thing, because it would be cheap and nasty to just have YouTube videos as visual content.

slightly tidied-up back-of-envelope sketch

That goes some way toward explaining how I can wake up with the unpleasant suspicion my sinuses have been raided, only to see the dog standing close to me.

So much for the dog tentacles… now, earworms?

All I need do is say “Birdy Dance”. Bang, gotcha! You have incessant Birdy Dance in your head. If you’re as unfortunate as me, it’s going to be there for a while. In some cases, days.

Now give that stuck song something to reinforce it, and I’ll be wearing the tune for weeks. Mind Hacks blog had an article on the phenomenon today, linking to this Cambridge study:

Earworms (‘stuck song syndrome’): Towards a natural history of intrusive thoughts

Abstract: Two studies examine the experience of ‘earworms’, unwanted catchy tunes that repeat. Survey data show that the experience is widespread but earworms are not generally considered problematic, although those who consider music to be important to them report earworms as longer, and harder to control, than those who consider music as less important. The tunes which produce these experiences vary considerably between individuals but are always familiar to those who experience them. A diary study confirms these findings and also indicates that, although earworm recurrence is relatively uncommon and unlikely to persist for longer than 24 h, the length of both the earworm and the earworm experience frequently exceed standard estimates of auditory memory capacity. Active attempts to block or eliminate the earworm are less successful than passive acceptance, consistent with Wegner’s theory of ironic mental control.

I’ve got a reinforced earworm just now. I’d  just pop in a YouTube video of the original, but Warner Brothers have removed the only instance I found … here’s a guy doing a pretty passable version of the song anyway…

It’s “Your Favorite Thing”, originally by Bob Mould’s band Sugar, and the Sugar version has been haunting my mind, both waking and sleeping, for a couple of weeks now.

It’s all about jumpy fingers, you see… the small twiddly thing between the chords (an appogiatura according to Herself, who is V Clever about musical things), and  the vaguely lifelike sausages on my left hand (The One Wot’s Supposed To Do The Fretting Stuff). I was never Richard Thompson before ruining my back, and the little neural interruptions that happen up in the vicinity of cervical vertebra number 7 have taken care of most of whatever skill I once had.

This is Richard. See Richard play. Now hear the gritting of your humble bloggist’s teeth.

I sleep and dream that I’ve been suddenly drafted into a pickup band for some tribute show. I’m to do rhythm guitar for the set, which will kick off with a supposed-to-be-like-the-CD version of “Your Favorite Thing”. I dream rehearsing, I dream playing, I can even feel those stupid bloody fingers doing That Darned Appogiatura.

Waking up with the song still grinding its 3:53 of pleasurable poppiness through my mind, I think… dammit, I own a few too many stringed implements for a bloke with a mostly-numb hand.

And somewhere inside…

…Django grins and flips me the bird.

If anybody wants me, I’ll be sleeping on my appogiaturas.