Friday, February 10, 2006

In Search of "THEY"

Jo - my mother-in-law - will be here in less than two weeks, and she knows these people. They are known as they. She thinks they really exist. Maybe they do. Then again, maybe they don't. I can't be sure, but I've always doubted their existence. It seems that they only appear when she's trying to prove her point. You know what I mean? She normally doesn't talk about they. But, they seem to always magically appear in the statement: "Well...you know what they say?" Including her imaginary friends in her statement somehow, in her mind at least, gives her argument credibility. I've learned to come back with a "...just who the Hell are THEY?" Her response varies: someone on the radio, a newspaper writer, somebody on T.V.... "Oooohhhh, I see. The incontestible, panoptical, unprovable they."

Jo: I'm sorry. I take it all back, and I'm sorry I doubted you. You see...they have moved into our house.

There's a group of little people living in our house, and they are taking control of our iPod. I've never seen 'em (that's my cute little pet name for they), but I know they are there. You see, they are the little people who live in our iPod and decide what will come up next when we shuffle our songs. I can't remember when they moved in, but I do remember what happened.
I'm pretty sure it was a few months ago on a Friday night. We always set our iPod on "shuffle songs" mode during dinner, and that night was no exception. It was either close to the end of dinner, or shortly thereafter that I said something like: "Wow! They sure are playing a lot of Red Hot Chili Peppers tonight!" Mrs. TBF looked at me like I was insane (...maybe I am, maybe I'm not...) and said: "Ummmm...who are they? Are you referring to the 'little people' in the iPod who choose the songs???" "Why...yes...I guess I am", I said.

...and they have been with us ever since.

They have been accepted by Mrs. TBF. However, she thinks they like me much more than they like her. "Wow, they sure are playing a lot of Rush and Yes tonight..." is one of the usual comments I hear.
So I figured that since Mrs. TBF took the iPod with her on her trip to the U.S. this week that they would be going along with her on her trip. I was happy for 'em since they don't get out too much. But, it appears that they either stayed behind, or that they have now produced progeny. You see, they have now taken control of my laptop.
This past week, since I've been sans iPod, I decided to hook my laptop up to our stereo receiver so that I could play my iTunes songs through the stereo. After listening to the "party shuffle" for a couple of days, I suddenly noticed that there was a preponderance of Italian music (i.e. Jerry Vale, Eros Ramazzotti, Frank Sinatra, Andrea Bocelli, et al.) "What the heck's going on here?", I thought. Then I noticed it: They had somehow moved into my laptop and had switched my iTunes to "Mrs. TBF's Music" playlist.
I spoke with Mrs. TBF a couple of nights ago, and she insists that she didn't do it. Now I'm scared.
What will they do next?

5 comments:

CanadianSwiss said...

Hey! I've heard about 'em. They used to be in those card shuffeling machines at the casino! But I heard they quit. Or were they maybe relatives?

Unknown said...

Just watch out you might find yourself dreaming about 'em next!

Bobby The C said...

or perhaps you have turned into a drunk Colm and just keep muttering 'em, 'em, 'em

The Big Finn said...

M.S.-That is soooooo obtuse. I love it!

The DP said...

maybe They are just looking out for your best interests and want you to have Mrs TBF music so you can feel like she is there.