Song

And now for something completely different ...

Not that you didn't love all that self-indulgent melancholy girl rock, of course. Yeah, that's what I thought. Don't worry, falling into dirty chick funk will happen again. Stay Tuned.

In the meantime, one of the songs that never fails to get me up and going. I should probably use it to wake up to in the morning, except that I really love it, and don't want to ruin it by having to hear it in incremental bursts as I hit snooze repeatedly.

This is also a favorite for several reasons, which I have deemed nothing short of a sign. First, because it took about three full-plays of this album to dig a jeep out of a river in Kakadu Park, where we decided to head a little bit too soon after the Wet. I remember being horribly irritated at Gary, the British prat who got us stuck in there, and would spend the rest of our camping trip committing the equally unpardonable sin of getting shotgun all the time because he got "car sick." Um, shotgun is mine, beeotch.

Second, because I forgave ol' Gary when he turned out to also have magnificent balance for dancing on tables in Darwin under the influence of many pitchers of XXXX. Also to this song.

Finally, as our story draws to its close, and in an ironic twist of fate, Gary would also be riding shotgun when we hit a kangaroo on a 2-day drive from Alice Springs to Sydney and got pretty banged up. Unscathed from my backseat ride, I had a plane to catch and so the last time I saw Gary - fully bandaged from waist-up - the TV in his hospital room started playing this song as I walked in to say goodbye.

So what? It was a popular song in Australia in 2002. Sure, that's it. But when I hear it, I wonder how something can make me want to dig with a bucket, shimmy my hips like a drunk Turkish woman on a very unsturdy table and feel the heavy irritation of having to say goodbye to people while wanting to strike a pose and say "Superstylin'." My one regret of saying goodbye to Gary was that I did not do the latter. He would've appreciated the gesture, I think.

Here's to you, Gary. Next time, let the lady sit in front.