I decided to start fixing up the parlor the other day, as I’ve really had an itch to clear a proper space for some wall hangings. Before starting work on the mold and rotting wood, though, I wanted to play a little work music (or eine kleine werkmusik, as Mozart might call it) on the stereo, so I might feel energized for the hard work ahead. As luck would have it, I couldn’t borrow Tyrone’s stereo, as his room was locked and I didn’t dare knock to disturb the very funkular beats I heard coming through the door. So I thought I would try playing music on the television, which, as Tyrone tells me, has entire channels devoted to music and music videos, a point he drove home by expounding for a half hour at least about one such video in particular.

At the moment, the only TV we have is a microwave-television combination set, which I gather was designed by this man, who, from the looks of it, has much the same kind of animal infestation issues we do. So I pushed it from the kitchen into a spot in the center of the parlor, and hoping to find a little Wagner to make fun of as I worked (or maybe, luck of lucks, some Dvořák to enjoy), turned it on. I was transfixed. Apparently I had found, on first attempt, one of these music channels, and what’s more, one that exclusively played the most hypnotic music known to microwave television:

I couldn’t believe it. In an instant, the song was seared in my brain, from the first reverberant notes of an oversized drum to the last, plaintive cries of a squished man. I can’t say for sure, as the afternoon and evening are lost in a haze, but I wouldn’t doubt I watched that music video channel for hours, legs tucked under my bottom, hands on my knees, waiting with acute yearning for the song to play again.

There it was!! And as good as the first time. What fun this music television turns out to be! Discarding chores in favor of the font I had found, I endured the long, half-hour commercial breaks in between repeats of the music video–advertisements selling, for all I could tell, morons and kitchen islands–wondering all the while why Tyrone hadn’t told me about this song before.

It wasn’t until three or four in the morning a day or two later that I realized the damage the song, like any drug, had done to my mind. Like a chigger finding flesh after eating through an inch of wool, the song had bitten down on my brain’s core and had refused to ever let up. When today I returned to the microwave television, finding it still perched on a stool amongst the rabbit-warren-honeycombed plaster piles of the parlor, I thought I might watch a few of my favorite movies, but I was dismayed to find I couldn’t watch without that song creeping in my ears.

I’m not sure what I’ll do to rectify this.

That song is really catchy.