The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #2794   Message #13857
Posted By: Jerry Friedman, jfriedman@nnm.cc.nm.us
02-Oct-97 - 10:58 PM
Thread Name: Naughty kids' greatest hits
Subject: RE: Naughty kids'greatest hits
Hi back to you, Alice C.! I was at Lomond elementary school in Shaker Heights 1966-73. I seem to recall that Fairfax wasn't that far away.

The version of "The Night of the King's Castration" I learned at Princeton in about 1980 seems to have been influenced by the counterculture, because it began, 'Twas the night of the king's castration, the night of the king's last ball. And all the counts and councillors were gathered around the council table flinging pieces of camel turd, for bullshit was unknown in those days and camel turd was the word."

Also, "...but Daniel slipped in a pile of lion shit and came in fifth, losing ten points for the common people."

(I wonder if this had any influence on the late Roger Zelazny, another Clevelander, who named an important character in his Amber series "Random". It's the kind of thing he'd do.)

"Skunk Hole" is in the DT, with the WRONG TUNE. (It should be "Dixie", not "Turkey in the Straw".) That song and "Baby Bumblebee" remind me of this one, to the tune of "If You're Happy and You Know It" (later in life, it was "If you're horny and you know it, pull your pud):

Oh, I wish I was a little English sparrow, (2x)
I would sit upon the steeple and I'd spit upon the people,
Oh, I wish I was a little English sparrow.

There was another verse about wishing I was a little MOSquiTO, but I don't remember the rest.

At the same camp, my brother learned one that began, "I'm a camper, a dirty little camper./ I leave a trail of bug juice wherever I may go." (Bug juice = Kool-Aid et al.) This was apparently a parody of one from our mother's day: "I'm a villain, a dirty little villain."