You were born too late, I was born too soon

The Friar did a little DJing at the Hangout tonight. I don't mean he was scratching vinyl; he just played mp3s off his computer into the sound system. Of course, T-Bone, Courtney and I were there to cheer him on and help pick songs. We played a little Arctic Monkeys, "Brick House," some Kanye, lots of Prince, the Cure, "Paper Planes," "Night Fever," Led Zeppelin, and much more, mostly what appeared to be songs about backing asses up.

Gradually, as the place filled up, we got more and more requests, which I, being the most approximately sober, fielded. I had the college kids write down their requests, and if the requests weren't too atrocious, I passed them along and Friar maybe played them. He yielded to two demands for some boring crap called T.I. that was insanely popular. I got him to play two Latin songs neither of us had heard of, mostly because there were about 12 Hispanic young people there in a group, and they ruled that dance floor. Also, one of them had a very revealing dress on. Yes, I am far more likely to listen to you if you have boobs and they're on display. Sorry, fellows.

One very youthful-looking guy came up and said to Friar in a pedantic, correcting tone, "This is a young crowd... You want to play the hits. This song is old." The song that was playing at the time? Madonna's "Vogue" (1990). Yes, we are old people. Dammit, the young people need to hear some classics, too! But they sure clapped and cheered when the hits they knew were played. How sad. These young people today and their T.I. tomfoolery.

One guy, who seemed like a decent young man, asked us to play "Sussudio" by Phil Collins, and handed me a five-dollar bill. I nudged Friar and relayed the request, and he shook his head. "Give him his money back," he said. "I can't sell out that much."

Good times.

***

In related news, I have now been using the last.fm service for two years today. It's a great application for OCD list-makers like me. It keeps track of your total number of tracks played, top artists, and top songs. It tells me that I have listened to 35,519 tracks since October 11, 2006. That, it adds, is an average of 49 tracks per day. Gee, that's like four albums. Per day. For two years. And what do I have to show for it? A short little span of attention and a head full of ideas that are driving me insane. Perhaps, like Comic Book Guy on the Simpsons, I've wasted my life.

...Nah.