Oll Raigth

The last time I was a bad girl in the way that Nancy Reagan just says no was maybe six years ago when I ate pot brownies and spent the evening in a corner speaking Prisencolinensinainciusol. It was at a party of a friend of Bryan's, an architecture party where everyone there seemed to speak in straight lines and wore black. When somebody offered me a brownie I scarfed it down, giggled, then grabbed Bryan by the elbow and told him we had to sit on the window ledge overlooking Polk Street. It was raining and I could not turn my head to face the party. Instead I stared out the window and spoke Italian. Spanish. I whispered in French. At some point I remember saying Ich bin zustimmt nicht although in real life I do not speak German, or Italian really. I speak Spanish only enough to ensure I never publicly piss my pants, and French only if the person to whom I'm speaking thinks that R.S.V.P. is short for Really So Very Polite. But that night it flowed, my own pot-fueled pidgeon language of paranoia and circles, and Bryan spoke it right back, one of the best conversations we've ever had. I don't know how we got home.

This video reminds me of that night. And of Serge Gainsbourg. Strangely enough it reminds me of the way I dance, too, all emphatic elbows and knees, except maybe without the panache of a blond Italian woman who sees little reason to button her shirt.

The lyrics here are pure gibberish, of course, intended to sound like American English as heard by a non English-speaker. But to me the song sounds like Hello Monday Morning of a Short Holiday Week with a rousing chorus of Rad. I don't know--it makes me happy--this disco rap goodness from 1972 like a giggle in the back of my throat. *Flashback* If I close my eyes I can still hear the traffic from Polk Street below, the sound of the prostitutes calling to each other in the night.

Happy Monday! (Oll Raigth!)