The Best Medicine

     Yesterday during our weekly coffee and bagel assemblage we members of the Panera Posse fell to lamenting how awful the news seems to be these days.  You open the newspaper or turn on the TV or online news and it's all crime, corruption, shootings, terrorists, floods, tornadoes, Iraq, Egypt, Congress, and a hundred other things to make you too scared or depressed to step off your front porch.
    Somebody in the group suggested that we  should all just put down our newspapers and turn off the news.
    "Then turn on the radio, "  I suggested
    But alas,  sometimes the conversational topics move at such a lively clip among the Posse  that the window of opportunity for commentary can be small, and so yesterday I didn't get around to  sharing with them why we should turn on the radio or to which radio station we should tune.
    But that's okay, I'll share with you all now that:
    1.  We should all turn on the radio to divert and heal our minds from the effects of the news we just saw, and
    2.  To this end we should turn to our local rock station and listen to the songs.  Or rather, more specifically, the song lyrics.
    Because, if you listen closely to today’s rock and rap music, you'll hear some really funny lyrics.          I'm not kidding.  I believe that today's pop lyricists have taken on the public service of cheering us up by sticking a random funny line here and there into an otherwise serious song with the express purpose of making us make us laugh and ask, “Wait, did they really say that?”
    For example, if you turn on our local Columbus pop station, 107.9,  you’re likely to hear some of the following lyrics:
    She’s a beast
    I call her Karma
    She’ll eat your heart out
    Like Jeffrey Dahmer
             "Dark  Horse",   Katy Perry and Juicy J                                                                                                                                                                                                                  
    But you lied again,
    Now you get to watch her leave out the window
    Guess that's why they call it window pain
                 “Love  The Way You Lie”, Eminem                                                                                                                                                                                         I’m staring at ya trying to figure out how you got in them jeans.
                 "21 Questions", 50  Cent

    So let me get you in your birthday suit  
    It's time to bring out the big... big... big... big... BIG... BIG... balloons!
                “Birthday”, Katy Perry

      My soul is spiraling in frozen fractals all around
                "Let It Go”, Idina Menzel
 
      My OCD  is conkin’ me in the head
                 “The Monster”, Eminem

      I love you like a fat boy love cake
                “21 questions” 50 Cent

    In fact, The song “21 Questions” by 50 Cent is a veritable treasure trove of funny lyrics.  There’s one passage where the rapper goes into a sort of a rogue Dr. Suess cadence:

                Could you love me in a Bently?
                Could you love me on a bus?
                If I got locked up and sentenced to a quarter century
                Could I count on you to be there to support me mentally?

      And then there’s one more song I want to mention, though it’s slightly off-subject, called, “Talk Dirty” by Jason Derulo.  As you may guess from it’s title,  this song’s lyrics are for the most part obnoxious and annoying, a couple of examples being: “Got her saved in my phone under 'Big Booty'” and “Our conversations ain’t long but you know what is”. 
        Now you’re probably saying, so just don’t listen to it.  But here’s my problem:  Between each of the short verses of "Talk Dirty" there's this wonderful sort of Middle Eastern-klezmer-hip-hop fusion instrumental that I love. So in order to get to the good music I have to listen to the likes of "I don't speak the language but ya booty don't need no 'splainin'".
    Oh well, at least it takes my mind off the news. ;)