[stan] 4:35 p.m. - Song

Song: (Don't Fear) The Reaper
Artist: Blue Öyster Cult

Why: This song was playing on the radio at a co-worker's desk as I walked by. I immediately walked up and said, "I need more cowbell!"

I was met with a blank stare, followed by a quizzical look that said, "What the crap you talkin' 'bout dude?"

I then had to explain the Saturday Night Live sketch featuring Christopher Walken, which I don't have to describe any further because everyone else in the world knows what the crap I am talking about, dude.

[stan] 7:10 a.m. - Songs

Song: Jump
Artist: Van Halen

Song: Jump Around
Artist: House of Pain

Why: At some point during my shower, my brain decided that it would create a mashup of these two songs - the heavy synth intro from the former, and the repeated lyric, "Jump around, jump around, jump up, jump up and get down," from the latter. If I had any kind of music mixing or DJing skill whatsoever, I would be all over that combination. It was pretty awesome.

For the record, I neither jumped nor jumped around during my shower.

[stan] 8:40 a.m. - Phrase

Phrase: Panko bread crumbs

Why: I'm not really sure why this is stuck in there, except that I must have seen it on a menu or something recently. I don't even know what panko bread crumbs are, or if they are any different than regular bread crumbs. I suspect that panko is one of those words that restaurants like to put on menus to make their food look fancier, like "pan-seared" (meaning "fried") or "lightly grilled" (meaning "fried") or "aioli" (meaning "mayonnaise"). If I go in to Denny's to get some chicken fried steak (or chicken fried chicken, which is all kinds of redundant), I don't want to see "white chicken breast fillet dusted with panko bread crumbs then pan-seared and lightly grilled, served on a bed of romaine with aioli." Dude, it's chicken-fried steak!

[nicole] 10:23 a.m. - Song

Song: I've Got the Joy, Joy, Joy, Joy Down in My Heart
Artist: George Willis Cooke

Why: Except the version in my head is the Spanish version that I learned on a missions trip to Mexico in 1996:

Yo tengo gozo, gozo, gozo, gozo en me corozon. Donde?
En me corozon. Donde?
En me corozon.
Yo tengo gozo, gozo, gozo, gozo en me corozon. Donde?
Porque Cristo me salvo

We sang this at church on Sunday morning and it was so much fun. We all said "Where?" in the right place, and I even sang it once in Spanish to Stan.

Today it got stuck in my head because I was just so happy to be finished with American Novel that I felt like I was overflowing with "good tidings of great joy"! (There! I said it my way. Take that, lady!) I sang it all the way back to work.

[nicole] 8:45 a.m. - Song

Song: American Honky-Tonk Bar Association
Artist: Garth Brooks

Why: You're kidding, right? I have absolutely no clue what could have possibly happened to trigger this song. Seriously. I stepped into the elevator, and immediately the song was in my head. I even started singing it aloud in there. It went straight from my head to my mouth, and I honestly couldn't control the urge to sing it. I was shocked at myself. Fortunately, I was the only person in the elevator.

Incidentally, I have a suspicion that there are security cameras in all of the elevators, so I'm always a little cautious about my actions in the elevator. No talking to myself, singing to myself, signing to myself, or dancing around to the music in my head. I save all of that for the restroom stall.

[stan] 7:40 a.m. - Song

Song: Stand By Your Man, as sung by The Blues Brothers
Artist: Tammy Wynette

Why: As I was getting clothes out of my closet this morning, I glanced in the corner where I have a few VHS movies stacked on top of a box. The Blues Brothers was one of those movies. My brain just flashed to the scene at Bob's Country Bunker where the "Good Ol' Blues Brothers Boys" are singing this song and the crowd finally stops throwing beer bottles at them (well, almost).

[stan] 10:49 a.m. - Song

Song: I Had a Little Chickie (ice cream truck version)
Artist: Unknown

Why: It's back! Except I need to make a correction to the first post where this was stuck in my head: I actually had heard the tune since I was kid, just not the words.

See, every summer the neighborhoods of Portland were filled with either this tune, or a few measures of "The Entertainer," or, appropriately, "Pop Goes the Weasel," being played (really, beeped) over the squawky PA system on ice-cream trucks. You know the trucks I am talking about. Ranging in size from three-wheel converted parking-meter-reader buggy straight on up to windowless "raper van", these vehicles were driven by the most creepy of characters. I preferred to call them "carnies with a driver's license." The kids would excitedly run out to the street to buy Popsicles or Drumsticks or those ghetto ice cream sandwiches that cost like two cents but are still super delicious, while their parents would be hiding behind the trees with firearms and machetes in case something went awry.

So anyway, I am not sure why I thought of that whole scenario, but it's the ice cream truck version of "I Had a Little Chickie" that's stuck in my head right now.

Nice.

[jana] 10:18 p.m. - Song

Song: Walking in Memphis
Artist: Lonestar

Why: I don't know, but I've actually had songs about locations in my head all day. Mostly, I've been going back and forth between "Walking in Memphis" and "Oh Canada." Who knows why?!?