Finally catching up with the club kids

OK, I know I'm way late in jumping on the Kala train, but I just noticed that M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes" completely rips the main riff from The Clash's "Straight to Hell." You're probably all yelling "DUH" at your computer screens right now (all three of you), but you would think I'd just discovered that eggs come from chickens, given my amazement.

I still give props to M.I.A. for turning it into a hypnotizing song with a gunshot chorus - and if you're going to sample, you might as well do it from a worthy band - but The Clash wins points for that one super-serious bass note, "It ain't Coca-Cola - it's rice." It makes me giggle (sorry Joe and Mick, probably not what you intended).


I'm going to have to keep playing the first 20 seconds of each song over and over until the novelty wears off.

Easter candy ingested thus far:

Malted milk Robin's Eggs: 8
Marshmallow peeps: 6
Lemon cookies: 2
Giant chocolate-covered s'mores thing from Economy Candy: 1

Prognosis: Diabetes

They're the people that you meet/When you're walking down the street...

In one of those rare but beautiful moments that makes me feel like all of New York City is my own tiny neighborhood, I saw the same pair of people twice on the train today. It was a young-ish mother and her young son, who was probably about 5, and this woman blew my mind a little. Apart from the fact that she had some amazingly huge false eyelashes, she also made child-rearing look as simple as making pancakes.

When I saw them this morning, they sat across from me and I got sucked into watching the mom trying to get her son to eat a banana. She peeled it for him - even carefully peeling off the icky strands of quasi-peel - and broke it into manageable pieces. Which her son promptly dropped onto the floor. Well, all but one piece that his mom rescued while he looked hopelessly at her. She just sighed and picked up the pieces and held on to them. She didn't even shoot him a dirty look.

And THEN, when I got on the train tonight (after the gym, which included 30 minutes of the let's-kill-your-abs class, thank you very much) I saw them AGAIN. Crazy. They got on right after me and the moment they entered the little boy started crying about something. When his mom asked him what was wrong, he of course just kept bawling for no reason. She just sighed again and let him cry against her coat. Wow.

I am still in awe of this woman's patience. Usually when I hear screaming children on the subway, I fantasize about them disappearing to somewhere really cold, but this woman just took it all in. Which is why I've practically got the boarding pass for the train to Hell and this woman will get a walk-in closet in her Heaven suite. Seriously though, it was a magically sappy moment.

In other news: I can't guarantee more sappiness, but I'm guaranteeing more posting. Because I suck at it lately. Did you hear the one about the doll people and the alligator? No? Good, because I'm going to tell you. As soon as I do my taxes...