Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs

Subject: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: John
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 01:50 AM

I know we have all done it, and it's only when I see the printed word in DT or this MARVELLOUS forum, that I realise how my ear has deceived me as to the real lyrics.

For years I listened to a Scottish friend sing "The Shoals of Herring". There's a part which goes ...I was cook and was quarters sharing... I had always honestly thought that the words were ...I got crook on a quart of sherry...

Anybody else wish to share their translation gaffs?

Regards John

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Rick
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 03:14 AM

Funny that, I always thought that line was

I was cook, and I'd a quarter share'nt

- quarter share of the profits...

I've only been singing it like that for 20 odd years...

Rick.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Ted in Australia
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 07:17 AM

when I was much much younger I had this line wrong from the hym "My cup's full and running over". I was convinced that it went " my cuboards full of roll me overs" I thought that "roll me overs" must have been something real cool to eat. Shoals of Herring is a favourite of mine too. Regards

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Sharon
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 08:08 AM

Kids do a lot of this mistranslating. One of my Kindergarten kids wanted to sing a song about the running tooth. All the other kids knew which song it was. Only I, the adult, didn't recognize the words to "his tooth is marching on" from the Battle Hymn of the Republic. The same with the song about the "mittens." You know... John Jacob Jingleheimer's mittens.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Alan of Oz
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 10:01 AM

"Angel of the Morning" has a line "Just brush my teeth before you leave me" which could be mistaken for ".....Touch my cheek.........".

Or is that the other way round?

Madonna has a line in "Material Girl" - "If they can't raise my interest then I'll have to let them be" or is that "If they can't raise nine inches then I'll have to let them be"?

Cheers,
Alan

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Mountain Dog
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 10:03 AM

Even though it's not exactly in the folk category, I'll offer a favorite misinterpretation:

I remember wincing the first several times I heard Juice Newton's "Angel of the Morning", wondering if she was really singing:

"Just call me Angel of the Morning, baby, Just brush my teeth before you leave..."!

(Others insist she'd said "Just touch my cheek..." You listen and decide.)

This served to reinforce the wisdom of an old friend who said: "Don't believe a word you hear and only half of what you see."

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Mountain Dog
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 10:06 AM

Alan!

Whether it's great minds thinking alike or fools seldom differing, I think we've just had an instance of trans-hemisperhical coincidence. No sooner had I posted my Juice gaffe, than I saw yours appear. DT meets the Twilight Zone, eh?

(Glad to know someone else heard it that way, too.)

Yours, amused and amazed.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: sharon
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 11:52 AM

Love that song "Mist covered Mountains of Home" but was really frustrated trying to learn the words listening to it sung on cassette. "High Roads??", soon I will see you. "Heroes??" see them o see them......

Then I discovered the lyrics recently, onlline, and found that it was " Hi, ro" and "He, ro"....

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Ferrara
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 12:22 PM

For the record, I have also learned Shoals of Herring as "I was cook and I'd a quarter share in", i.e. a share of the profits. I believe it was printed that way in one of my books, as well, and I believe this version is correct. Don't believe everything you read. There is at least one very popular wordbook that is riddled with mistakes. In another book, the words "She's the combination ..." have become "How we love the choo-choo on the Wabash Cannonball"!

There are even tapes and CDs where you can tell that the singer couldn't quite understand the original words. Ray Fisher's liner notes to the Night Visiting Song begin the last verse with "And when that long night was passed and over/ And when the smoke clouds began to grow ...". Now, we have Norman Kennedy singing it as well, and I am 99.9% certain that what he's singing is "And when that long night was past and over/ And when the small cocks began to crow ..."

By the way, I just looked it up. Norman's version is in the database.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Susan of California
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 12:50 PM

Ok Sharon, since you brought up kids mistakes..... When my son was 5 or 6 he loved to sing the U.S. National anthem. But the words at the end were "wrong" I have to admit I let him sing it his way for a while, I prefered it. Here are his words: "Oh say those stars and stripes spangling in that pale, Amer-i-can wa-aa-ay.. For the land to be free, and the home of the brave!"

And for those that aren't familiar with the 'standard' version, it goes like this: "Oh! say, does that Star-Spangled Banner yet wave, O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?"

He sang it with such passion and feeling that it was almost sad when he learned the "standard" version. He sure doesn't sing it that way any more...

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: RS
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 12:55 PM

My brain is not connecting the hypertext link to the rest of the song this comes from, but I remember many years ago trying to transcribe the Beatles song with the words (approximately): "but if you go quoting the words of Chem and Mow, you ain't gonna make it with anyone anyhow" ... and wondering whether Chem and Mow were some famous singing group that I hadn't heard of yet ... it wasn't until much later that I realised this was "Chairman Mao" they were referring to!

(No, it's not folk, hope that's ok ... )

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Alan of Oz
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 08:14 PM

Mountain Dog,

Just shows ya gotta be quick.

Cheers,
Alan

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Helen, also of Oz
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 09:32 PM

Hi all,

I am enjoying this thread, and I'll admit to being the world's worst at hearing lyrics correctly, mainly because I focus more on the melody/musical arrangements. They could be singing pure drivel and I wouldn't care as long aas I like the music. On the other hand I never could understand other people's fascination with Bob Dylan & Leonard Cohen because musically I (IMHO) think they belong in kindergarten.

Enough of this - 2 things:

The 3 mistaken lyrics I can think of straight away, and I know I'm part of a huge crowd in the first 2 instances.

Jimmy Hendrix - "scuse me while I kiss this guy" and I was so impressed with him coming out of the closet in such a spectacular and international way, until I realised that it is "kiss the sky"

Manfred Mann's Earth Band: "wrapped up like a douche" - don't ask me what that line really is, I have no idea.

A TV ad for Seiko watches: I could have sworn the jingle said "Seiko, losing time with Cheryl Ladd" until I finally worked out that it was "moves in time"

Secondly, have you seen this website? It's totally devoted to misheard lyrics. http://www.wco.com/~arsenio/tool/

The site is called "Tool Mondegreens" because of a misheard folk lyric - you'll have to look it up, I can't remember which tune it was.

Helen

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From:
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 09:50 PM

Hi again

Just a quick update: The Jimmy Hendrix song I mentioned was Purple Haze, The other one was Blinded by the Light (I think, but that was the beginning of the chorus).

I apologise now if anyone is offended by the lyrics in some of the songs in the Mondegreen site - I checked the site after I posted the thread.

And the quote from the site about the misheard folk song:

'The term "mondegreen" can be attributed to a 1954 Atlantic article by Sylvia Wright. In the article, she wrote of a folk song she thought contained the lyrics "They had slain the Earl of Moray/And Lady Mondegreen." It took her years to discover that she had been wrong; the lyrics had actually been "They had slain the Earl of Moray/ And laid him on the green." '

Helen

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Charlie Baum
Date: 10 Jul 97 - 11:42 PM

I remember hearing of an article in a scholarly journal about the difficulties computers would have recognizing speech. The article was entitled: "How to Recognize Speech, Not Wreck a Nice Beach."

And I remember reading in John Jacob Niles' Ballad Book of his informant who told him the King of Fence sent tenny balls (from a tenny tree, whatever that might be) instead of the King of France sending tennis balls. (See also Shakespeare's Henry V, Act I).

The mind's attempts to fill in lacunae create interesting turns of phrase.

--Charlie Baum

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Helen
Date: 11 Jul 97 - 12:17 AM

Charlie I heard a joke about that more than 20 years ago. A computer can translate between English & Russian, and vice versa.

The test phrase used was: the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. All went well in the translation from English to Russian, but on translating it back again into English the phrase was: The vodka was good, but the meat was terrible.

Sorry - but not very ;-> Helen

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Alan of OZ
Date: 11 Jul 97 - 12:38 AM

The Wreck a nice beach quote came from Bill Gates referring to his speech recognition team's imperfect efforts.

Cheers,
Alan

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Wolfgang
Date: 11 Jul 97 - 05:00 AM

I started learning English listening to folk songs (learning expressions like, e.g., "raging main" so useful in daily conversation) and trying hard to find out the lyrics. Now I sit there sometimes and compare my notes with the DT database. I was so proud for example when I found in the three volume Websters a nonstandard meaning of the word "bandoleer" which made remotely sense of my line "she was courted by a young bandoleer". The DT has "she was courted by young Vandermeer" (Darcy Farrow is the song). What a letdown. Read also the recent thread "The fields of Athenry" started by Teru for a nice example.

Cheers Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 11 Jul 97 - 07:39 AM

A couple of points: a) The Digital Tradition is certainly NOT an iron-clad reference for "correct" words. We're as good as our contributors and editor(s). And no better. If you find (or think) we're in error somewhere, please let me know.

b) The study of Mondegreens is a fascinating one. COnsider the Christmas trinity of "Round John Virgin, mother and child", or the two animal-based hymns, "Gladly, the Cross-Eyed Bear" and "Lead On, Thou Kinky Turtle".

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: rich r
Date: 11 Jul 97 - 11:06 PM

I too have auralallia (the listening equivalent of speaking in tongues). For many years I sang the last verse of Gordon Lightfoot's "Long River" as:

When this land was made , it was made for the wanters.

It always bothered me as to what exactly is a "wanter" in this context, but a couple other singing companions concurred in this interpretation. Only more recently did I see a printed version of the lyrics to find out that this land was "made full of wonders"

I also learned Fred Hellerman's "Borning Day" from a scratchy library record by the Brothers Four and had no clue what kind of tree they were getting "down" (I.e. fluffy stuff, not vertical displacement) from. I resorted to mumbling the word knowingly as if I was perfectly sure what i was singing about. Fortunately nobody asked. A couple years ago I finally sent a request in to the Sing Out! Songfinder. Nobody replied, but after some months Holly Tannen found a printed version of the lyurics and sent them to me. With that in hand I went to the botany section of the university library and found out that the "moffle tree" is a real plant from the Carribean area and they actually get some kind of bedding product by scraping off the inner bark.

Good grief this is a long post for a couple of botched words.

rich r

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Yellow Door folky girl
Date: 12 Jul 97 - 03:32 AM

A mistake made by a member of McGill's Folk Music club a couple years ago. Tommy Sands' "There Were Roses" = "neurosis"

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From:
Date: 14 Jul 97 - 04:59 AM

In that well-known folk song "Heart of Glass" by, er, Blondie, does Deborah Harry really sing "Cheesy like a zither"? Or what? Ian

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Jon Whitney
Date: 14 Jul 97 - 02:10 PM

A common one from the blues world - a description of a steam locomotive which goes "smokestack's black 'n' the bell it shines like gold" often gets converted to the nonsensical "Smokestack Lightning shine like pearly gold" or "Smokestack Lightning building shine like gold".

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Susan of California
Date: 14 Jul 97 - 07:10 PM

Helen,

Manfred Mann was covering Bruce Springsteen's "Blinded by the Light" which appears on Bruce's _Greetings from Asbury Park_ album(1973). The line is "...And she was blinded by the light/Cut loose like a deuce another runner in the night/ Blinded by the light..."

I will admit that I love Bruce (I spent my formative years in New Jersey-what can I say?) and knowing the words sure doesn't help me understand the meaning! I always sort of thought it ha d something to do with numbers running or drug use or ????

Hope this helps a wee bit :-)

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Jon W
Date: 14 Jul 97 - 07:33 PM

That's funny, I always thought it was "wrapped up like a deuce, you know the runner in the night" Still doesn't clarify the meaning though. As for Beatle's songs, who can forget the immortal line "The girl with collitis goes by" from "Lucy and the Sky with Diamonds."

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: alison
Date: 15 Jul 97 - 08:11 AM

Hi

Moving this thread into the '80's I quite like Paul Young's 'Every time you go away, you take a piece of meat (me) with you."

And

"Beat me up with your lettuce." (or is that "letters"????? I prefer to think of it as lettuce myself) From "Is that love" by Squeeze.

Slainte

Alison.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Sheye
Date: 15 Jul 97 - 08:59 AM

Speaking of the Beatles (mucho earlier in the post), does anyone recall Lennon's tune "Might As Well Be On Pause". You can say Mars if you want to; I quite liked the idea of occasionally living on pause.

Enjoy your day!! Sheye

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From:
Date: 30 Jul 97 - 04:56 AM

my own humble mistake. From the rascals' song, "Groovin"... i always thought the line was....

"life could be exctasy, you and me and Leslie"

i guess my young mind was already tuned to the erotic potential of a menange-a-trois. Quite disapointed to discover actually words are...

"life could be exctasy, you and me endlessly."

alas.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Rocket Ron R
Date: 30 Jul 97 - 02:13 PM

For some time I was convince the word to the Ozark Mountain Daredevils song were

There's a rooster on the horizon And it damn near fills the sky Thank you lord For Canadian rye

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Bill D
Date: 31 Jul 97 - 09:09 PM

In the English Music Hall song "A Little Bit of Cucumber", I could never figure out where in England the locale of 'Matcheses' was....like in "I can go to Matcheses, but what I do prefer..." It wasn't until I got up the courage to ask a English friend that I understood that it meant " I can occasionally enjoy some tomatoes"...
Now I understand the comment that "The US and England are two countries divided by a common language."

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Alice
Date: 02 Aug 97 - 11:39 AM

This is such a fun thread! Re: translations, I remember the story told to me by a marketing director of Northwest Orient Airlines. They used to have a song lyrics, "put wings to your heart" in ads. When they translated it into ads for Japan, the song became, "put feathers on your blood pump". I also recall John Prine relating the experience of having a fan request that he sing the "Happy Enchilada" song. She had heard the lyric "half an inch of water" as "happy enchilada". Alice

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Rocket Ron R.
Date: 02 Aug 97 - 02:51 PM

And of course a misheard lyric can with time become seen as the normal version. In Wild Mountain Thyme a large number of people sing at the start of the second verse

I will build my love a *tower* By yon clear crystal fountain And on it I will pile All the flowers of the mountain.

I've even seen it printed in songbooks. The correct word, which then makes the verse actually make sense, is bower, which is the sort of thing you would pile flowers on.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Peter Timmerman
Date: 03 Aug 97 - 09:15 AM

An old girlfriend of mine thought that the line of Bob Dylan's "To Be Stuck inside of Mobile with Memphis Blues again" referred to the plight of being locked in a mobile home (trailer) with an entire Southern U.S. football team.

Yours, Peter

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Dick Wisan
Date: 03 Aug 97 - 11:39 PM

Christmas Carols, for some reason, seem particularly liable to mondegreens, maybe because we learn them so young. I remember thinking about "the little Aw Jesus asleep in the hay" --I'd heard the expression, but now I knew what it was. And, I remember working out that Born couldn't have been King of Israel until some time after Solomon.

But my nicest one wasn't a Christmas carol. I distinctly heard, on the radio, many times,

"Yellover, so high in banana tree."

Someone's third grader daughter asked me what it meant, and I had to explain how, in Switzerland, in the winter, when people in a little villages in the mountains get lonely, it's hard for them to climb all the way down their mountain and up the next mountain to talk to someone in another village. So, they get out their alpenhorns (digression on the nature of alpenhorns) and blow. And the folks in the next village on the other side of the valley hear and understand, and they come out and blow their alpenhorns to show they're ready, and THEN

They have a Yellover.

Bless us all.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: LaMarca
Date: 04 Aug 97 - 01:29 PM

When I first started singing folk songs, I was learning bunches of stuff from the Celtoid supergroups of the 70's; Planxty, Bothy Band, Silly Wizard, etc. Since I'm an American from Wisconsin, I had a wee bit of a problem with the Irish and Scottish accents, needless to say. My favorite msitake was my original rendition of "Broom of the Cowdenknowes", where I thought the chorus line went:

"Fain would I be in my own country
Held in my fair one's arms"

I was embarassed to find it was supposed to be

"Herdin' her faither's yowes" (Herding her father's ewes for us American English speakers)

Guess I didn't understand the average Scotsman's love for his sheep...

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Adrian
Date: 05 Aug 97 - 11:32 AM

Not from a song, but the Lord's Prayer. My mother, a teacher, told us one day about one of her students who was heard to say "Our father, with chart in heaven. Harold be thy name."

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From:
Date: 08 Aug 97 - 10:27 AM

I can't recall any trouble with folk songs, which are usually sung fairly clearly, but I have had trouble with pop songs.

For years I thought that the line "And the moon is the only light you'll see" in Ben King's "Stand By Me" was "And the moon is the only flying pussy", and couldn't figure out what that was supposed to mean. Some obscure Southern slang, I thought.

When I was younger we tried to play the Stones' "Beast of Burden". The singer was French and had got the lyrics from listening to the LP. He came out with "I don't want your pizza burnin'".

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Nonie Rider
Date: 25 Sep 97 - 07:17 PM

My musical hearing is bad enough that if I can actually manage a Mondegreen, I'm grateful; usually things make even LESS sense than that.

I heard the Beatles' "Paperback Writer" as "Take the Back Right Turn" for over a decade...

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Jerry Friedman
Date: 25 Sep 97 - 10:57 PM

In some contexts, these Mondegreens (great name!) are also known as the "folk process".

How many millions of American children have thought "America" goes "My country 'tis of the sweet land of liberty"? (For the damn furriners, this song to the tune of "God Save the Queen" begins "My country, 'tis of thee,/ Sweet land of liberty,/ Of thee I sing.")

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Dan Bynum
Date: 26 Sep 97 - 10:13 PM

My wife swears that for years, she though Creedence Clearwater Revival were singing "There's a bathroom on the right." Obviously written by someone who grew up in the porcelain industry.

And have you ever noticed on The Lion Sleeps Tonight, the background singers are singing "My wings are wet, my wings are wet...."

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Art Thieme
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 11:21 AM

In "Hard Times Come Again No More" I heard a line as "the whale that is hurt upon the shore"!

In "January Man" the line "Poor November Man" Ialways heard as "Porno vender man"

In the Child ballad "Lord Lovell", the phrase "This Turk, he..." I once actually saw printed in a book "This turkey...". Ever since it's made me laugh whenever I hear the song.

Art

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Kris
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 12:14 PM

Not from a song - but my mother is a bottom-less well of malapropisms & similar.

My favourite one is her claim to have parked in a multi-coloured-starpark.

Kris

(multi-storey-carpark was the less attractive truth)

As to her financial arrangements : she barks at Bankleys.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Bob Landry
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 12:18 PM

According to the story, Santa Claus' sleigh is pulled by 8 tiny reindeer. According to Gene Autry, there really are 10: Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, Rudolf (with the shiny nose) and Olive, (the nasty other reindeer who used to laugh and call Rudolf names).

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: SteveF
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 01:28 PM

Back when I was counting the days to get my first driving permit, I empathized with Lloyd Price in "Personality," whose girlfriend would "walk with personality, talk with personality, plus you've got a great big car-ar-ar!"

--SteveF

P.S. - Just yesterday I heard the song "Angel of the Morning" played on the local radio station. When it finished, the DJ commented, "Y'know, for years I thought she sang 'just brush my teeth before I leave...'"

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: catspaw49
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 01:59 PM

Thanks for bringing this back, I've really enjoyed reading it!

When I was about 6, I asked my Grandfather who read me Bible stories nightly, "Who's ANDY?" He asked if I meant Andrew, the disciple. "No, I mean ANDY." He loked at me sorta' blankly and I said we sang about him in church. Obviously still confused, I said, "You know, Pop...ANDY walks with me. ANDY talks with me. That ANDY!" Poor ol' Pop got to laughing so hard he left the room...and I never did get an answer from him! catspaw49

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Brack&
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 04:59 PM

In the last verse of The Fields Of Athenry, I always sang "she watched the last hour falling". I was told recently that it should be "the last star falling". Now I don't know which one is right!

Another is a line No Man's Land.

The countless white crosses stand mute in the sand or
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand.

Mick Bracken

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From:
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 07:10 PM

"Mute witness stand" makes more sense. They generally didn't bury them in sand.

Of course, there is the joke about Olive, the other reindeer. They even sell stuffed Olive The Other Reindeer toys now.

For years I thought the words in Star of the County Down were "down a bowling green", instead of "down a boreen green". I had thought it very civilized of the Irish to have bowling greens in their villages.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From: Uncle Fred
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 07:23 PM

This has been REAL entertaining. Our friend Dorothy always thought "She's got a ticket to ri-ide" was "She's got a stupid giraffe". Then there's Pete Seeger's "ONE TON Tomato, Why she's a ONE TON Tomato, One ton to-MAY-TO..... Robert Hunter maintained for years that if his lyrics sounded like something else that made sense, that they should be sung that way. Later on he was finally per- suaded to put out a book of all his lyrics. It's called BOX OF RAIN....I recommend it highly.

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From:
Date: 06 Jan 99 - 07:50 PM

My mind generally slips into low thoughts when I mishear things. I thought that the line in that song "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" was "Girls just want to get f****d" and was shocked that it would be permitted on daytime radio. In fact when I hear it, I am still convinced that is what she is really singing. Who was that-- Madonna? Cindy Whatshername?

For years I heard the line in the John Prine song "Grampa Was A Carpenter" as "urinate in every pew". Years later I learned it was "hearing aids in every pew." And of course, with Prine, as I might have mentioned, I heard "eat a lot of peaches" as "eat a lot of pizza", which I thought an odd thing for a back to the land person to do.

Speaking of peaches, I once took a course from an Australian professor whose accent I could not fathom, and who taught a subject that was to me rather difficult. One day in answer to a question of mine he stated "perhaps some peaches would be of assistance." I was in the depths of despair -- what had I missed? What could peaches possibly have to do with the subject at hand? Was he mocking me in some subtle Australian way? I was doomed to fail in disgrace. Then he drew some pictures on the blackboard. . .

Subject: RE: Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs
From:
Date: 07 Jan 99 - 12:14 AM

I've loved the animated film "The Secret of NIMH" since I was a child. The theme has always been one of my favorite songs. It's a lullaby called "Flying Dreams." Music is by Jerry Goldsmith, lyrics written and sung by Paul Williams.

Part of the lyrics are as follows: "Sleep for now. Dreaming's how Lovers' lives are planned. Future songs and Flying dreams, Hand in hand..."

For years I thought part of the lyrics were as follows: "Sleep for now In Dreaming Town where Lovers' lives are planned..."

Oh, well. Another childhood illusion bites the dust.

Sincerely, Mary