The one question that people ask me more than anything else is “How do you get your biceps all firm yet billowy like that?”
The second question that people ask me more than anything else is “What is your biggest weakness?”
Let’s focus on that second one.
I have a horrible addiction: I am addicted to serenading women.
It all began in first grade, when our class learned how to (roughly) translate the English alphabet into Egyptian hieroglyphs. I wrote a poem for a girl named Alphonsine* in Egyptian hieroglyphs. Sure, I got sick of writing hieroglyphs after the first two lines (the little eagle things are hard, man), and eventually decided to finish the last two lines in plain-old English, but hey! I was hot stuff—four lines of panty-melting, swoon-inducing, first-grade creativity. Mentally, ladies were putty in my ink-stained, booger-laden hands.
Ten years and 37 awkward poems later (32 if you don’t count haikus), two more addiction-enabling events occurred.
First, I was introduced to the guitar. Suddenly, getting a woman’s attention was as easy as learning how to play “Smoke on the Water”.
Second, I met Maxwell Q. Maxwell (the Q. standing for “Maxwell”). After working together to prevent a speeding bus full of orphans (and a few puppies) from careening off Northeastern Ohio’s only and highest cliff, we got smoothies and realized that we had both been turned down as potential prom dates by the same woman, Blanchefleur!
And so the band was formed.
Everything was organic. We played to our strengths: Maxwell fell into the role as sex appeal and music writer, and I fell into the role of all things motility-related. A lot of folks get down on Maxwell for being an immotile man made of pillows, but that’s always inspired him to write as powerfully as he can.
And then the addiction seriously began. It started small, with ditties describing a particularly fun date, or a tune describing how sorry I am that I can’t kiss any better (it’s tough to get feedback, you know). Each song was heard. That was the rule. If it was written, it was heard.
The problem grew. I fell passionately in love with a girl at Panera who took my application for a summer job. A song was written, and that song was heard. Maxwell and I are no longer allowed to eat at that particular dining location.
The addiction got more complicated. Soon, kazoos and accordions were added to the mix.
Most recently, Maxwell and I wrote a song for a girl named Dieudonnee who turned out to have a boyfriend. Since hearing the song, Dieudonnee has spoken roughly six sentences to us, and they have all involved some variation of, “OK, see you later …”
Just like a man who learns about the issues and loses his ability to be patient with Bill O’Reilly, Maxwell and I learned the ways of melody and eventually lost our ability to express feelings without the aid of music. We are now simply unable to emotionally connect without the help of a musical instrument. It’s made intimate conversation very difficult, with the exception of a kazoo fetishist whom Maxwell dated during my senior year.
If we encounter a good-looking girl, we simply cannot focus until we’ve composed and performed a song in an awkward, public location.
Why are we telling all of this to you, an astute reader? Because music has always been there for Maxwell and me. When the world turns its cruel back on us, we find solace in the fact that we can write a song about it that will irritate a woman.
Where can a person find hope when rejected by the world? Maxwell and I find comfort in being rejected by women.
Without the creative outlet of getting “Politely Turned Down,” we’d pretty much die.
Without those gentle soprano tones informing us that “She Very Much Likes The Song, But It’s Not Really A Good Time,” we would be lost and alone.
Without those lovely ladies describing how “It’s Not You It’s Me Now Please Leave Me Alone,” we would be totally adrift.
‘Tis the lot of a performer.
Also, we wanted to use the Voice as a platform to serenade yet another woman. The message is in secret code: just start reading at the beginning, selecting successive letters of the chorus to Elton John’s “Your Song,” and the resulting message is the chorus of Elton John’s “Your Song,” which describes our feelings for a young lady whose name’s component letters appear scrambled throughout this letter.
And as far as the biceps go, I do push-ups.
*All names of females referenced in this article have been changed to protect these females’ dignity
Awesome.