rushin' around

Oh. My. God. Lately, I feel like songs get jarred into my head and will not dislodge themselves from my inner workings. It's like walking around to a soundtrack you never needed. Last week, it was a mixture of Somebody Told Me by the Killers and Take Me Out by Franz Ferdinand. I don't have a particular problem with these songs, except that my local "alternative" radio station plays them with alarming frequency. Both songs have this chorus that... ugggh! I'm walking, the beat just kicks in, and I start hearing "boyfriend...looks like a girlfriend...boyfriend...girlfriend" or "I say don't you know... you say I don't know... I say you don't show..." Make it stop!!! Okay, I take it back, I do have a problem with the Franz Ferdinand tune, because it's tired in some way I can't quite put my finger on. On the other hand, for no good reason, I just want to belt these lyrics out all the time to anyone who will dare to hear me:

It's not confidential, I've got potential

And here's another one, that just keeps wanting to be hollered:

I'm coming out of my cage, and I've been doing just fine
Gotta gotta be down, because I want it all

Damn you, Killers! In case you haven't guessed by now, the song that will not get out of my head right now is Mr. Brightside. I know there are plenty of good Killers tunes out there, so please don't give me a lecture about how I'm going for the obvious choice. There was no choosing. I was just driving down 280 last night, the pitch black highway, save my headlights and the hint, over the hills, of citylights, and I had the pedal to the metal. And why? Because a) it was late and I really wanted to get home and b) Mr. effing Brightside and Somebody effing Told Me, back to back on the FM. Do you think the cops would have gone for that excuse? "Sorry, officer, I know I should have been going 65 mph, but you see, The Killers were on the radio, and I had a hallucination that I was in a BMW commercial. Yes... I know that this car could never be mistaken in a million years for a BMW. But you see... it was the radio..." Thankfully, the traffic gods were looking down on yours truly, so I managed to escape notice.

Why was I trying to impersonate Speed Racer down 280? Well, some windfall of luck befell me and I got second row seats to a pro tennis match. Of course, it was opening night of the tourney, so I didn't see Agassi or Frat Boy, er, I mean, Roddick. But my partner in crime, Richie Rich, did get to watch Jan-Michael Gambill suffer a steady beatdown by a Korean dude with calves that were positively scary. This guy was fluid. So... Gambill is like an older, star-has-fallen version of Roddick, and plays similarly- a lot of power, little finesse. He had a ridiculous number of aces in the match. However, the Korean dude, okay, I'm going to stop calling him that- Hyung-Taik Lee is his name, dominated every time a long volley was involved.

I discovered, however, that I have no business being in the second row at a tourney. First of all, I was so excited by how great these seats were that I couldn't stop grinning. Secondly, Richie Rich and I could not stop making wisecracks throughout the game. At one point, Gambill was down 3-5, 30-40, and Lee was serving. Lee was about to let one rip, and Gambill says "hold on, sorry, just a minute" signalling to Lee that something was distracting him, and forcing him to stop mid-toss to re-serve. Richie Rich turns to me and goes "hold on, sorry, I'm about to lose the set" and I was left trying not to burst into laughter in the middle of a critical set point. As revenge, I turned to RR, pointed at one of the SAP officials, and commented "I'm pretty sure that's Grampa from the Munsters," which caused RR to lose some of the water he was sipping. We really belong in the nosebleeds.

Don't shed too many tears for Gambill, incidentally- midway through the second set, he sat down to change his shirt and the audience burst into cat calls at the sight of his abs. Classy, San Jose!