Five (More) Things People Did To Me at the Library This Week
Whomst let the dogs out?
Another week passed, and so did I (mentally, spiritually, aerodynamically). Katniss salute me, because people have been playing games at the library.
Let’s get into it.
A woman asked us to take pictures of her feet. This is not a service we provide.
Whomst let the dogs out?* This man your honor, who slid his spongy-ass Birkenstocks off and set them ever-so-gently on the board book shelf, like his own little preschool cubby.
A man tried to cut the extremely clear line, but met opposition, and that opposition was me. Not on my watch, buddy. Make like ~orinoco and flow to the end of the line.
A man insisted I was a “lying cunt” because I lied and told him we didn’t get the newspaper delivered. He’s not wrong, I am a cunt.
A man asked if she could eat lunch in our breakroom. This is also not a service we provide.
*According to the Rugrats wiki (the most knowledgeable source on the topic), “‘Who Let the Dogs Out?’ is a song performed by Bahamian group Baha Men, released as a single on 26 July 2000. Originally written by Anslem Douglas (titled "Doggie") for the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival season of 1998, it was covered by producer Jonathan King under the name Fat Jakk and his Pack of Pets. He brought the song to the attention of his friend Steve Greenberg, who then had the Baha Men cover the song.”
Mental Floss adds, “Steve Greenberg, Baha Men's manager—who had previously steered Hanson to chart-topping glory—was adamant that “Who Let the Dogs Out” would reverse the band's fortunes. The group had just been dumped by Mercury Records after selling fewer than 800 copies of their 1998 album Doong Spank.” You know, probably because the album was named Doong Spank. Anyway, back to the Rugrats wiki: “The song became the band's first hit in the United Kingdom and the United States, and it gained popularity after Rugrats in Paris: The Movie and its soundtrack album.”
Now, Rugrats in Paris: The Movie came out, according to Wikipedia, on November 17, 2000, which means that, if we believe the Rugrats Wiki, there was a whole month of a Baha Men/Who Let the Dogs Out Summer in August 2000 that we were robbed of. The song existed of course, but the Rugrats in Paris: The Movie (kingmaker that it was) did not happen until the winter after the dogs were let out by persons unknown, which means that we then had a solid 7 months before Who Let the Dogs Out would be bumping at American pool parties. (These are, sadly, the only pool parties I can report on from experience. I am available to any interested parties that wish to increase my international pool party experience ledger.)
There’s been a lot of dispute about these so-called “facts” about Who Let the Dogs Out, to the point where there’s a TED Talk about getting to the bottom of it. Ben Sisto was like a dog with a bone (sorry) when it came to uncovering the truth about the song’s origins. Mental Floss explains, “Sisto has a theory about why the single struck such a big chord with listeners, too. “Baha Men’s version opens a cappella. The vocals have a gravity that stops everything else in the room. Before having time to consider what 'Who Let the Dogs Out' even means, the listener is transported to a world of pop, junkanoo, and barking that's both catchy and annoying, head-bobbing and soul-screaming," he says. "It also seems people can’t decide on exactly what the non-question means. What does it want from us? It’s as if the Uncertainty Principle itself was a pop song. In a way, I think it’s that confusion that hooks people. It sounds like Doritos taste: Unnatural, but undeniable.”
Sometimes you come across a phrase so perfect, you can’t help but share it in its full context. Who Let The Dogs Out does, immaculately, sound exactly like Doritos taste: Unnatural, but undeniable.
Goddamn.
Like do you ever get angry, in a full-out rage, seeing someone so casually toss out a turn a phrase that you would kill to have written? I don’t mean “I wish I wrote that Lord of the Rings quote about wishing none of this had happened, and how so do all who live to see such times but that is not for them to decide, all we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us” or “I wish I could have written Can’t Handle This (Kanye Rant)” or that Good Bones poem or the entirety of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek NO. I want to have written that a song sounds like Doritos taste.
Ah well.
We all have to have goals. What’s life without aspirations?
yee haw y’all,
hayley
In August 2000 my family was on holiday in America. For British people, this was like being on holiday in The Movies. We got to do things we'd only seen on TV, like eat corn dogs and drink mountain dew and go to Walmart. We watched American TV, which back in those days was way ahead of UK TV and had new things we hadn't seen yet. We saw the video for Who Let The Dogs a LOT and it was also on the radio constantly. Five kids in the back of a rental car shouting WHO WHO WHO WHO. It was the soundtrack to our holiday. When we got back to the UK, no one knew the song. It was like it had never existed, except as part of our family lore. Until Rugrats. Suddenly, finally, someone had let the dogs out.
I really love these. And then the pivot to Who Let the Dogs Out? Amazing. I feel enlightened. And having pinpricks of memories of my class scream-singing "WhO LEt the DOgS OuTTT" in school. Maybe dance class? Can't be sure.