2 Live Crew -- "Me So Horny" (1989)

I'm like a dog in heat 

A freak without warning

I have an appetite for sex

'Cause me so horny . . .

Ahh! Me so horny!

Me love you long time!

2 or 3 lines covers the full gamut from the sacred to the profane.  Our last post was on the sacred end of the spectrum, but this one is profane with a capital P. 

"Hip Hop 101" is designed to be a comprehensive survey of rap history, warts and all -- get ready for some warts.

I'm going to be honest with you.  2 Live Crew is a pretty bad rap group, and this song sort of sucks.

That doesn't mean that this post sucks.  To the contrary, this post is great -- 2 or 3 lines knows how to make lemonade out of lemons, boys and girls.  So keep reading -- watch me do my magic!

If you've never seen the late Stanley Kubrick's 1987 movie, Full Metal Jacket, you need to correct that situation toot sweet.

The first half of the movie is a depiction of the basic training of a platoon of Marine infantrymen circa 1967, and features a tour de force performance by R. Lee Ermey, who had been a Marine drill instructor from 1965 to 1967 and served in Vietnam before he got into show biz. 

"Me So Horny" was inspired by the notorious scene in the movie when two of the platoon's members are solicited by a Vietnamese prostitute:

Time to shift gears.

Henry Louis Gates, Jr., is an African-American literary historian and critic who is a professor at Harvard University.  He has written a number of books, the most famous of which is the The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism (1988).  Gates has received 51 honorary degrees and many other honors, including a MacArthur "genius" fellowship.  In other words, he's kind of a big deal.

Two years ago, Gates returned home from a trip to China and couldn't get the door to his house open.  A passer-by saw him and his driver break a window so they could get inside, and called the police.

The officer who came to investigate allegedly treated Gates rudely, and Gates -- assuming he was being hassled because he was black -- allegedly responded in a hostile fashion and got himself arrested for disorderly conduct.

Oprah with Gates

This little contretemps set off a brief but intense spasm of debate among dueling pundits on the cable-TV news [sic] channels.  Even Oprah got into the act. 

Eventually, an independent panel of experts from across the nation investigated the incident thoroughly and came to the conclusion that both men had acted like major A-holes.

President Obama invited the professor and the policeman to the White House to have a beer and watch a little porn.  (OK, OK, I made up the part about watching porn in the White House.)

So what does a heavy-duty African-American intellectual like Professor Gates have to do with a sleazy rap group like 2 Live Crew?  

Luther Campbell

Before I answer that question, let me give you a little background information first.

The brains behind 2 Live Crew was Luther Campbell, a Miami rapper and record label owner who called his label Luke Skyywalker Records until Star Wars director George Lucas sued him.

In 1989, 2 Live Crew released their most successful album, As Nasty As They Wanna Be.  The song from that album that generated a lot attention -- but very little radio airplay (thanks to its lyrics) -- was "Me So Horny."

The conservative American Family Association and others complained about As Nasty As They Wanna Be to every politician in Florida who would take their calls, and eventually a state judge in Ft. Lauderdale ruled that there was probable cause to find that it was legally obscene.  The county sheriff warned local record store owners not to sell the album, and 2 Live Crew sued him.  But a federal judge ruled that the sheriff was right.

A record store owner then sold a copy to an undercover police officer and was arrested.  Three members of 2 Live Crew were taken to the poke when they performed some of the songs from the album at a local club.  

Eventually, a federal court of appeals overturned the lower court's ruling that the album was obscene.  Helped by all the publicity, As Nasty As They Wanna Be -- a mediocre album at best -- went on to sell over two million copies.

Professor Henry Louis Gates testified in favor of the defendants at their trials.  Here are some excerpts from his direct examination:

Q. And you have listened to the recordings of the songs, "Me So Horny", "Fuck Shop", "If You Believe In Having Sex" and "Come On, Babe"?

A. I have. . . .

[Note:  You think that the good professor might have been wondering at this point if agreeing to testify in this case was really such a good idea?]

Q. Is rap a form of art?

A. Oh, absolutely, it seems to me it can be defined as art.

Q. Does it detract from being art because the words that are used are four-letter words?

A. Oh, no, not necessarily. The greatest literary tradition in English literature, like people such as Chaucer and Shakespeare . . . has always had its vernacular, has always included a lot of lewdity, a lot of verbal puns, sexual puns, curse words, et cetera. . . .

[Note: "lewdity"?  I know what "lewdness" means -- never heard of "lewdity."]

Q. Are we to take the lyrics literally that we heard on the tape?

A. Well, there is very little art that should be taken literally. . . .

["Me So Horny" and the other 2 Live Crew songs listed above] have taken one of the worst stereotypes about black men, primarily, but also about black women, and blown them up.

Q. What are the stereotypes?

A. The stereotypes that have been most commonly associated with black men in western culture is the fact that we are oversexed or hypersexed individuals in an unhealthy way. . . .

How do we overcome that stereotype? I think one of the brilliant things [is that] they embrace that stereotype.

Q. What do you mean?

A. Well, they represent the stereotype over and over again, in such a graphic way, namely to exploit it. You can have no reaction but to burst out laughing.

There is no cult of violence here. You can't hear any danger at all in the background. What you hear is great humor, great boisterousness. . . .

Everybody understands what is going on. Even if they don't understand it as a literary critic, they understand it on a subliminal level. Their response is to bust out laughing, to view it as a joke, a parody.

Parody is one of the most venerable aspects of any literary tradition. It is certainly very important to Afro-American culture and literature.

Q. If you took [the lyrics] literally, would you be missing the point?

A. The whole point is . . . [t]hey are not to be taken on a literal level. They are to be taken on their figurative or metaphorical level.

I think Professor Gates in certainly correct when he says that "Me So Horny" and the other 2 Live Crew songs that were alleged to be obscene should not have been taken seriously -- the whole album was a big goof.

I don't know much about obscenity law -- I've had some pretty shady clients in my legal career, but none of them have been in the porn business.  But I don't think parodies are automatically protected from being considered obscene.  

The law of obscenity says that a work that depicts sexual conduct in a patently offensive manner and appeals to the prurient interest is obscene unless it has serious literary or artistic content. 

Does "Me So Horny" have serious literary or artistic content?  Hey, I'm as big a fan of the First Amendment as you can find.  And I'm a big fan of rap music (a fact which mystifies my children and many of you).

MC Hammer

But "Me So Horny" and the rest of the album it is on is, in a word, crap.  I'm amused that someone with a summa B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D from Cambridge would compare "Me So Horny" to Chaucer and Shakespeare.  It is very bad rap music, even by 1989 standards.  (MC Hammer's "U Can't Touch This" was also recorded in 1989.  I'd love to hear Professor Gates opine on the literary and cultural value of that song.)

By the way, 2 Live Crew later recorded a parody of the great Roy Orbison song, "Oh, Pretty Woman."  Not surprisingly, the company that owned the rights to the original didn't want to license it to 2 Live Crew, which decided to make a parody of it any way.  The ensuing litigation made it all the way to the Supreme Court, which ruled in 1994 that a lower court had erred in finding that 2 Live Crew had violated copyright law.   

Here's "Me So Horny":

Here's a link you can use to buy the song from Amazon.  (Are you sure you really want to?)

Sonic Youth -- "Wildflower Soul" (1998)

Wildflowers 
For you today 

My oldest son (he was not quite 15 at the time) and I saw Sonic Youth perform at the 9:30 Club in Washington, DC in the spring of 1998.  They were touring to promote A Thousand Leaves, their 10th studio album.  "Wildflower Soul" is from that album, which had a very odd cover:

A Thousand Leaves grew on me slowly.  It is quieter and more subtle than Sonic Youth's earlier music -- it's Sonic Youth for grownups.   (Thurston Moore was about 40 when it was released, and Kim Gordon was 45.)   

The band takes its time on most of the tracks, including "Wildflower Soul," which is over 9 minutes long.  There's another 9-minute-plus song on the album, plus an 11-minute-long track.

I'm not much of a gardener and I'm not much of a photographer, but when I'm on a hike or a bike ride, I take a lot of pictures of flowers -- especially wildflowers.  June is peak wildflower season in Colorado, and I came back from a recent trip to Denver and environs with a lot of pictures on my Blackberry.

Here's a blanket flower -- possibly the Gaillardia aristata, or common blanket flower:

I think this flower is a Gaillardia suavis --- also called perfumeball, or pincushion daisy --  a related variety with small flower rays but a large, fragrant seedhead:

Here's an orange Indian paintbrush (genus Castilleja).  I saw quite a few of these:

Here's a wild rose -- perhaps a Rosa woodsii (Wood's rose) or Rosa arkansana (wild prairie rose):

Here's another wild rose:

This bright yellow flower is the sulfur flower (Eriogonum umbellatum):

This is a plume thistle (genus Cirsium):

Here's a shot of this thistle from above:

This is the musk thistle (Carduus nutans), also known as the bristle thistle or nodding plumeless thistle:

Here's a yarrow (Achillea millefolium), also known as "nosebleed plant" and "soldier's woundwort" because of its astringent qualities:

I think these are dwarf golden asters (Hetertheca pumila), but I could be wrong.  Asters, daisies, and sunflowers are members of the Asteraceae family, which has more than 22,750 accepted species -- so cut me a little slack if I'm not sure:

Here's a harebell, Parry's bellflower, or something from the Campanula genus:

Here's the invasive Dalmatian toadflax flower (Linaria genistifolia, subspecies dalmatica), which is an escaped ornamental plant that is native to Dalmatia (a historical region on the east coast of the Adriatic Sea that is now part of Croatia.)

Here's a closeup of the Dalmatian toadflax's flowers:

This is a Mariposa lily (Calochortus gunnisonii):

Last but not least, here's what I believe is a scarlet globemallow (Sphaeralcea coccinea):

I like flowers of all kinds, but I have a soft spot for wildflowers.  You can never have too many wildflowers on a hike or mountain bike ride.  They're scarce enough to seem special, and you have to admire their self-sufficiency.

Here's "Wildflower Soul":

Here's a link you can use to buy the song from Amazon:

Sonic Youth -- "Disconnection Notice" (2002)

Did you get your disconnection notice?

Mine came in the mail today . . .
It simply states "You're disconnected, baby"

See how easily it all slips away?

On the final day of my Colorado trip last month, I headed to Boulder after I had finished business.  My destination was Chautauqua Park, where there are hiking trails that go up into the distinctive rock formations on the eastern slope of Green Mountain that are known as the "Flatirons."

The Flatirons

Once again, the aural accompaniment for my hike was provided by Sonic Youth.  But I would be lying to you if I told you that I listened to this song on my Flatirons hike.

Some of us lie more than others.  Some of us have a greater need to lie.  

I lie all the time.  Sometimes I knowingly and intentionally lie.  Sometimes I don't exactly lie, but deceive by failing to tell the whole truth.  

Please don't tell me you never lie.  We all lie.  There is only one exception to this rule that I can think of: as I've observed before, I've never seen a dog lie.  Cats do lie, of course -- cats lie a lot.  (Cats are good liars -- perhaps because they don't feel one bit guilty about lying.)

"Murray Street"

"Disconnection Notice" is track two on Sonic Youth's 2002 album, Murray Street.   That wasn't one of the albums I loaded on to my iPod before heading to Colorado.

I haven't listened to Murray Street a lot, and I don't remember hearing "Disconnection Notice" until last week, when I was on one of my regular morning bike rides from my home to Lake Needwood. 

But this post is about my excursion to Boulder, Colorado, where my first stop was the Chautauqua Park ranger cottage.  I consulted the ranger on duty and met this critter:

I crossed Chautauqua Meadow, heading up the trail toward the First, Second, and Third Flatirons (there are five altogether), which are sandstone formations that are about 300 million years old.  

Images of the Flatirons are ubiquitous in Boulder, and there are more businesses with "Flatiron" in their name than you can shake a stick at: Flatiron Athletic Club,  Flatiron Cleaners, Flatiron Coffee, Flatiron Duct Cleaning, Flatiron Septic, Flatiron Sprinkler, Flatiron Ventures . . . you get the picture.

Here's a shot of downtown Boulder -- the white structure in the center of the photo is the University of Colorado football stadium:

I know this map is a bit hard to read.  Can you see the two little blue stick-figure hikers in the lower-right-hand corner of the map?  I followed the right-to-left path they are taking toward the Third Flatiron until the trail forked.

I took the left fork, which may look like it goes downhill.  But nothing could be further from the truth.

Shortly after the fork, the trail suddenly turned into this:

I should have turned around at that point, but figured I would go just a bit further.  That was a mistake.  For some reason, going down that stretch of "trail" was much harder than going up it had been -- perhaps because I couldn't avoid looking down the precipitous drop-off to my immediate right.

Any sense of dignity went out the window as I got as low to the ground as I could, and leaned hard to my left for the descent.  I toyed with the idea of calling the ranger cottage and requesting that a rescue helicopter be dispatched to bring me down, but decided that would create perhaps more of a fuss than I was prepared to deal with.  So I sucked it up and got her done.  

I went back to where the stick-figure hikers are and took the trail that goes from the bottom to the top of the map -- it takes you to the First and Second Flatirons.  

But before long, I ran into this.

That was as far as I went.

There were some very nice views coming down the trail.  Here's a picture looking north to the mountains of the Front Range.

And here's one final look back over my shoulder at the Flatirons as I approached the ranger station and the Chautauqua Park parking lot.

After hiking for a good two hours, I was ready for the traditional food of carbohydrate-depleted mountain bikers and hikers: a big-ass burrito.  So I drove to downtown Boulder and chowed down at Illegal Pete's.

     

Here's where the magic happens.  The comely young co-ed who is assembling my burrito in this photo later led me upstairs to the seating area and drew me a pint.

On the walk back to my car, I passed a barber shop that obviously depended on students for its clientele:

A television network news program once described Boulder as the "happiest place in the USA," and I believe it.  The city's free alternative newspaper, the Boulder Weekly, seems to survive on advertising for purveyors of medical marijuana, which is legal in Colorado.

Here's one such ad.  I bet you didn't know golfers Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods had licensed their images for use by sellers of medical marijuana and paraphenalia.

You can also find medical marijuana in Denver.  Here's an ad that was on a bus shelter near my hotel.

Colorado is also full of microbreweries and brewpubs -- I sampled several of the offerings of New Belgium Brewery, which is located in Fort Collins and is best known for its "Fat Tire Amber Ale."

Maybe it was just as well that I didn't have "Disconnection Notice" on my iPod when I was hiking the Flatirons -- talk about a song that would harsh almost anyone's mellow.  

But the happy Boulder atmosphere plus an Illegal Pete's pork carnitas burrito (with optional guacamole) and a pint of New Belgium's seasonal "Somersault Ale" overcame the effects of the many equally angry, or gloomy, or angry and gloomy Sonic Youth songs I did listen to that day.  There was no need for me to seek a marijuana Rx.  

I'm also featuring "Disconnection Notice" on 2 or 3 lines a day today.  I've never featured the same song on both blogs on the same day, but there's a first time for everything.  "Disconnection Notice" is just too perfect a song not to use on "Bad Romance Tuesday." 

Here's "Disconnection Notice":

Here's a video of a live performance of the song at a Swedish music festival:

Here's a link you can use to buy the song from Amazon:

Sonic Youth -- "Shoot" (1992)

I won't be asking your permission to leave

I won't be asking not to have this baby please

Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon (the founders of Sonic Youth) have been married since 1984.  But a lot of Gordon's songs -- including this one -- don't sound like they were written by a happily married woman.  

I like Gordon's singing, but there are times -- "Shoot" is an example -- when there is only a distant relationship between the key in which the band is playing and the key in which she is singing.  (I don't think this is by accident.)

Kim Gordon

I would have loved to get up into the mountains when I was in Denver last month, but I was occupied by business until about 5 p.m. each day I was there.  That limited how far away from my hotel I could drive and still have time for a nice long hike.  

After hiking along the High Line Canal my first two evenings in Denver, I decided to get out of the city my third day there.  I drove about 30 miles west to Matthews/Winters Park, which covers about 1000 acres in Jefferson County, Colorado, just south of Golden (the home of Coors beer).

The trail I decided to hike there -- the "Red Rocks Trail" had plenty of ups and downs to provide a good workout, especially given that I was never below 6000 feet.

I started at F1 on this map and followed the Red Rocks Trail to F6.  I covered about 5 miles in a little less than two hours.

Near the beginning of the trail, there's a small pioneer cemetery:

The outbound part of the hike was mostly uphill:

There were some nice views of red rock formations:

There were plenty of wildflowers, of course, like this blanket flower (Gaillardia aristata):

There will be plenty of Colorado wildflower photos for you to enjoy a little later.

Here's "Shoot" -- and here's a link to the complete lyrics for this song.  I'd suggest you follow along as you listen to the music:

Here's a link you can use to order this song from Amazon:

Sonic Youth -- "100%" (1992)

But I've been around the world a million times

And all you men are slime

I admit it. Sonic Youth's music was an odd accompaniment for hiking on a perfect June day in Colorado.  

Colorado wild
sunflower

Sonic Youth was formed in 1981 by Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon, who got married in 1984 and are still married today.  The band has always been based in New York City.  

They started out as a post-punk "noise rock" group -- their early music was heavy on dissonance and guitar feedback.  (Actually, their later music is pretty heavy on dissonance and feedback as well, but the early music really made your ears bleed.)

By 1990, their music had become marginally more accessible, although it was still located on the experimental, avant-garde portion of the alt rock/indie rock spectrum.   

Thurston and Kim

Sonic Youth's natural habitat is a dark, smoke-filled, spilled-beer-smelling basement club somewhere in lower Manhattan.

It's hard to visualize them performing live on a balmy summer evening at an outdoor venue like Red Rocks Amphitheater, which is nestled in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains just west of Denver and which was visible from one of the trails I hiked while in Denver recently on business.  

Red Rocks Amphitheater (near Denver, CO)

But when I was programming my trusty iPod for that Denver trip, I realized I hadn't listened to any Sonic Youth music in some time.  (I have nine of their CDs -- including the somewhat tongue-in-cheek album they released under the name Ciccone Youth.  Ciccone is Madonna's real last name, of course.)  So I loaded  up the iPod with five of their CDs and a bunch of hip-hop and headed for the airport.

Canal milepost

When I arrived at my hotel, I asked if there was a park with trails nearby.

I hit the jackpot -- I was only a couple of blocks away from a 60-mile-long hiking/biking trail that followed the course of the High Line Canal, an irrigation canal that was dug in the 1880's.  

High Line Canal

The canal is not wide or deep enough for boat traffic.  It averages 30 feet in width (but didn't look that wide to me) and only 2 feet deep.

But the trail that paralleled it was a perfect place to get some exercise after my business for the day was concluded.

You would think that a paved hiking trail through a busy residential/commercial neighborhood in a major metropolitan area would be a pretty tame place to take a walk.  The scariest things I expected to encounter when I started my walk were mosquitos, yappy little dogs, and sweaty, unattractive people.

Boy, was I wrong.  Check out this sign, which was right there on the trail:

"If attacked, fight back" -- are you kidding me?

"100%" was the first song I heard when I hit the canal trail because it is the first track on Sonic Youth's 1992 album, Dirty -- which was alphabetically the first of the Sonic Youth albums on my iPod.

Either Thurston Moore or Kim Gordon is the lead vocalist on most Sonic Youth songs.  The lyrics to "100%" were written by Gordon but sung by Moore.  (The man-hating lines quoted above would sound very natural coming from Gordon -- she's got a mouth on her, as you will see).

Here's the "100%" music video, which was directed by our old friend (and skateboarding enthusiast) Spike Jonze -- it features actor Jason Lee when he was just a teenager:

Here's a link you can use to order "100%" from Amazon:

Beastie Boys -- "Hey Ladies" (1989)

Words are flowing out 
Just like the Grand Canyon
And I'm always out looking 
For a female companion


Those lines could apply to any number of rap artists, who are rarely at a loss for words and who are usually in pursuit of the fairer sex.  But there's no one they describe better than the rappers who wrote them -- the Beastie Boys.

You "Hip Hop 101" students are fortunate indeed today.  I must admit that I am largely unacquainted with Paul's Boutique, the Beastie Boys album that "Hey Ladies" appears on.  But today's guest lecturer (we'll call her Professor "Linda," because that is her name) did her thesis on this seminal rap classic.

"Paul's Boutique" cover

A Beastie Boys song may seem like an odd choice for a middle-aged woman from middle America to write about, but "they" say women are always attracted to men with a sense of humor.  This band of merry pranksters from Brooklyn certainly has that going for them.

[Editor's note:  I feel bad to be interrupting Professor Linda after just one paragraph, but I just had to comment on that "middle-aged woman" comment.  I can't tell you how relieved I was to learn that Professor Linda was middle-aged.  I'm only about 6 months older than she is, so I must be middle-aged, too.  What a relief!  That might not sound like a big deal to some of you, but it's much better than the alternative.]  

You were introduced to the Beastie Boys a few months ago, when your regular "Hip Hop 101" professor lectured on "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party), so I will skip the usual biographical details."  I will simply note that the three Beasties -- Michael Diamond ("Mike D"), Adam Yauch ("MCA"), and Adam Horowitz ("Ad-Rock") -- have been together since 1982, making them probably the longest-lived hip-hop act in the world.

Paul's Boutique, their second album, was released in 1989, three years after their hugely successful Licensed To Ill.  Brimming over with samples, Paul's Boutique is now considered to be one of their best and most innovative albums. 

"Hey Ladies," the most successful single from the album, has the distinction of being the first single in history to chart in the Top 20 of both the Billboard "Hot Rap Singles" and "Modern Rock Tracks" charts.

Paul's Boutique wasn't nearly as popular with album-buying masses as the first Beastie Boys album.  Some thought it was too sophisticated compared to the raucous Licensed To Ill. 

Too sophisticated?  Had those people ever listened to it?!  The rhymes are unquestionably clever, but there's some pretty sophomoric stuff in here:

I met a little cutie
And she was all hopped up on zootie 

I liked the little cutie
But I kicked her in the bootie.

(By the way, a "zootie" is a joint laced with crack.)

There are numerous references to people and characters from the 1970 -- Sadaharu Oh (who hit 868 home runs while playing professional baseball in  Japan), game show host Chuck Woolery, and Chachi from "Happy Days."

I've got to give credit where credit is due.  There are a lot of words in this song with no repetition of verses and it took a great deal of thought and effort to string together that many words and come up with a reasonably cohesive and coherent lyric.

I'm not sure I ever heard the song on the radio, but the first time I saw the video, I was hooked.  It's a series of vignettes with mainly 70's themes.  Mike D acts out his version of Saturday Night Fever. There's also a nod to "blaxploitation" films of that era (like Shaft and Super Fly).  

The disco theme is carried out through the entire video, with a mariachi band thrown in for added visual interest.  For me, one of the best parts of the video is the brilliant use of cowbell by various characters.

There are at least 16 samples used in the song.  Some you'll quickly recognize, while others are more obscure.  The main musical sample is from "Machine Gun" by the Commodores.  James Brown is sampled at least twice.  At around 3:28 in the video, you'll hear "uh, good God" from Edwin Starr's "War."  And if you were paying attention during a previous "Hip Hop 101" class, you'll remember and recognize our old friend, Afrika Bambaata.  (You weren't expecting a pop quiz, were you?)

One sample in particular is worthy of special mention -- the "She thinks she's the passionate one" line from "Ballroom Blitz" (at about 0:46 in the Sweet video below, and at 3:11 of the Beastie Boys video that comes a little later).  That song was released in 1973 by the English glam rock band Sweet.  It's been covered by at least 30 other artists and was used in Wayne's World as well as the video games Rock Band and Guitar Hero.



"Ballroom Blitz" seems to me to be sort of a hybrid; it goes along at the manic pace of of a punk song, but singer Brian Connolly's increasingly empassioned screeching in the choruses borders on bad English cabaret music.  Considering that glam rock was a bit of a tongue-in-cheek genre anyway -- sorry to burst the bubble of any of you who take Queen seriously -- maybe that was the intent.  In any case, it's a great song and the sample from it was perfect for "Hey Ladies."

If you're looking for depth of feeling or philosophical introspection, early Beastie Boys is not going to be your source.  This was way before Adam Yauch discovered the Dalai Lama and Buddhist enlightenment.  But if you're in the mood for a hilarious goof on the 70's disco era and some pretty darn good beats and rhymes, click "play" and enjoy.

2 or 3 lines is grateful to Professor Linda for teaching today's class.  As you might have guessed, Professor Linda is the same person as Linda, the Chief Executive Senior Contributing Editor, or "C.E.S.C.E."  But because I am always forgetting that acronym, I have decided to call Linda our "A.B.C.X.Y.Z." -- not because it stands for anything, but because I know I will be able to remember it.

One final note:  2 or 3 lines set a new high in visits and page views last month largely because I added a rather random shot of ex-model Paulina Porzikova-Ocasek to my post on the J. Geils Band's "Centerfold."

That explains why this photo of Kim Kardashian appears here:

Kim Kardashian

Hey, it's your own fault.  If you people clicked on my ads and ordered from Amazon through the search box that appears on the right-hand side of every 2 or 3 lines post, I wouldn't have to stoop to cheap tricks like this to get my click numbers up.

Here's "Hey Ladies":

Here's a link you can use to buy "Hey Ladies" from Amazon.  (Remember -- order stuff through 2 or 3 lines or you'll be seeing more of Kim Kardashian's backside!)