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Here we come a-caroling, again

By S.K. Bardwell
Posted Monday, December 21, 2009

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Editor's note: It's Christmas week, and Susan has bailed out of column-writing to go do frivolous things, like wrap gifts and cook and try and prevent the much-beloved Joe Dog from eating the tree, or worse. So here's a timely column from 2006.

Shopping for groceries last week, I got my first dose of in-store Christmas carols.

As I’ve mentioned before, I suffer from an affliction that causes music to play in my head almost non-stop.

It’s usually not a problem. I can carry on conversations, conduct transactions, even read while listening to the music in my head. The music and lyrics to hundreds of songs are stored in my head, and I kind of like it—It’s like having a free iPod hot-wired into my brain.

But I’m also extremely vulnerable to external suggestion. As a rule, whatever I last heard plays in my head until I hear something else, or forcibly change the song by singing (to myself, usually) another.

That can be a problem. My resistance to external music is lowest when I’m tired or sleepy. When I worked in Houston I got up around 5 a.m. The clock radio was set on an oldies station, so I could end up singing “Muskrat Love” or “Boogie Oogie Oogie” as I walked my mile and showered.

Then I’d catch some of the local newscasts before I dressed, and end up singing the “Mattress Giant” theme song (“Oooh, aaah, oooh, aaah, only at Mattress Giant”) until I got to the truck and put in a CD.

That can get old. So can having “The Carol of the Bells” in your head while you drive your groceries home and put them away. Especially when it sounds like this:

"Hark how the bells/

Sweet silver bells/

All seem to say/

Throw cares away/

Christmas is here/

Bringing good cheer/

To young and old/

Meek and the bold/

Give a give a give a Garmin/

Give a give a give a Garmin"

You’ve probably heard the Garmin Christmas commercial too. I don’t know what they changed the lyrics to, the chorus is all I can make out, so that’s what sticks in my brain. And I had to Google it to see what a Garmin was, which makes me wonder how effective their commercial is.

There have been other problems caused by seasonal advertising. Here’s how “Good King Wenceslas” sounds in my head now:

"Good King Wenceslas looked out/

On the feast of Stephen/

When the snow lay round about/

Deep and crisp and even/

Brightly shone the moon that night/

Though the frost was cruel/

When a poor man came in sight/

Gath'ring winter fuel/

Sprite makes brighter holidays/

Limon is the reason/

Sprite goes well so many ways/

To bring good cheer this season"

At least I connect that one to a product. But Good King Wenceslas, the King of Bohemia in the 10th century and the patron saint of the Czech Republic, deserves better.

So, the holiday season has begun, sort of. I’ll be fighting to keep the herald angels and silver bells and three wise men out of my head for the next six weeks or so.

But everyone knows the season doesn’t really start until Santa sleighs down the hill on his Norelco.

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