LIKE FLIES ON SHERBERT

Today as I wound my way through the parking garage, fiddling with my access card, preparing to swipe it in front of a gray panel to raise the gate, it became clear that I had an itchy remote finger...

I reached open air, began surfing the satellite, and soon landed on a guilty pleasure: To Sir With Love. Hard cheese, I know.

But I especially like the weird jazz phrasing Lulu drops into the line “What, what can I give you in return?”

And then, 3:12 from my driveway, I found the Replacements doing Alex Chilton. Another pleasure, with which I have never associated a measure of guilt.

The line I really love here? “Check-checkin' his stash by the trash at St. Marks Place.”

Their respective lyrical hiccups put in high relief the fact that these two paeans are actually very closely bound.

And that realization made my journey home today feel oddly satisfying. It was like rounding a perfect circle...