Opening Line Hall Of Fame, Class of 2008
Danger! Another lunchtime post! And we all know how those go.
Part of my day job is to receive and evaluate manuscript submissions. Many are memorable, but one in particular sticks out, both because of the volume of its… well, there’s no nice way to put this, badness, and because it achieved this badness in so many diverse ways. Among the impressive ways it did this was the cover letter. Specifically the first sentence of the cover letter.
The author managed, in that first line, to insult the magazine at least four times. In a thirty word sentence, as this one was, that’s an insult every 7.5 words.
I mention this in the hope that the opening line of today’s strip joins that cover letter in my personal Opening Line Hall Of Fame, albeit for different reasons. It makes absolutely no sense, but it makes that no sense in the most delightful way possible.
“Don’t yo’ be fiddlin’ no beer joint music, Red Tommy.” Every time I try to parse it, I realize I like it better unparsed. I may, however, start using that as a response whenever someone says, well, anything to me.
Hey Greg, can you write a news story this week?
Don’t yo’ be fiddlin’ no beer joint music, Red Tommy!
The rest of the strip… you can see how it’s intended to make sense, but it just doesn’t. Why the frick does the Homeless Pye Boy Wacky Wedding Crashing Scheme involve playing music at all? And why would the guests request songs of other guests? Wouldn’t the wedding already have music covered? Or is there going to be a hoedown-off? (Oh please, let there be a hoedown-off!)
Are the Pyes actually trying to come up with music that the wedding party would want to hear and doing it very stupidly, or is it just that the extent of their Wacky Wedding Crashing Scheme is to play somewhat inappropriate music? Scholars will debate this like they debate whether Citizen Kane really thought his wife could sing or if he was just trying to force the crowd to clap.
And finally, the real question on everyone’s mind: Which college sweatshirt will Sturdy be wearing to get married in? I’m pulling for an elaborate handmade creation, taking bits of a sweatshirt from every accredited college and university in the country, plus the University of Dayton.
Things of note today:
Red Tommy looks, acts, and talks an awful lot like Rufus to me. Perhaps another long-lost relative?
Is it just me, or are the “homeless folks’” looking more and more cleaned-up and stylish? Both Red Tommy and Grandpa Pye are now wearing clean suit jackets stylish string ties, and the musicians all appear to have found high quality musical instruments somewhere.
As near as I can tell, the choice of “Orange Blossom Special” has absolutely nothing to recommend it but the bad flower pun and its status as a fiddle song—the lyrics are entirely irrelevant to the strip. Wouldn’t “Daisy” have been a much better choice? “It won’t be a stylish marriage;
I can’t afford a carriage.” What a missed opportunity!
Comment by PO8 — April 25, 2008 @ 2:54 am
I think that its inappropriateness is the point. None of the songs that have been suggested are quite what I’d want to hear played at my wedding. Or at any wedding, for that matter.
And all three of them are beer-joint fiddle songs.
Comment by rabrab — April 25, 2008 @ 10:01 am