I MIGHT Be Cool

The 16yo sings. He actually sings very well. On pitch and expressively and often very oddball songs that I've never heard before. Which makes me wonder, how can he remember all the lyrics to a song like The Last Saskatchewan Pirate but can't remember to read any book on the Accelerated Reading list, take a test, and improve his English grade?!?! Which brings us abruptly to an alternative music group known as They Might be Giants. Or to their devoted followers, TMBG. Last week while in the car with the 16yo, he burst into song. He sang of particle man, triangle man, universe man, person man and of their various interactions with each other. It sounded vaguely familiar. I laughed. I think it was last summer, I was in Sioux Falls, sitting outside on a very chilly June evening on Phillips Avenue taking in some live music. Which is ever so much more entertaining than dead music. More lively, if you will. Ahem. The band had been taking a break and were wandering back to their instruments in a random, leisurely fashion. The keyboard player, in an effort to amuse himself until his cohorts retook the stage, began plinking about and playing a song I thought he was making up on the spot. About guys called particle man and triangle man. I thought he was goofing around but it was a real song! The very song my son was singing! Which apparently is a song written and performed by TMBG. Then I remembered another musical moment maybe a year ago, when for some reason I was in the kitchen singing the lines ...Istanbul not Constantinople, Istanbul not Constantinople...and the 16 yo was impressed. Another TMBG song that I was aware of I think because of Bette Midler. They might be giants, but once in a while, when I least suspect it, I might be cool.