Nooooo! Not the Carpenters!

I got a kick out of the news last week that a group of musicians has banded together to protest the use of their songs as a form of torture for terror suspects. Detainees at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba have been routinely subjected to loud music at all hours, including Britney Spears, Bruce Springsteen, Eminem, and the ultimate weapon in the war on terror: Barney the Dinosaur.

I can certainly understand the effectiveness of this form of torture, especially in the case of Barney and the ever-annoying I Love You, You Love Me song. If I were a terrorist, I'd crack after just a few strains of that song, giving up Osama bin Laden's hiding spot in a matter of minutes.

This got me thinking about other songs that would work well against terrorists. One that springs to mind is Merry Christmas, Darling by the Carpenters. It's not that this is even that terrible a song, it's that it has been really, really stuck in my head these last several days, and I'm thinking about more and more about revealing bin Laden's hiding spot.

The really bad thing about this song is that my brain isn't even playing the whole song over and over again in my head. It's just playing the line that says, "Logs on the fire… fill me with desire." Something about that line strikes me as funny. I don't know. I guess I just think it's funny that logs on a fire get her all hot and bothered, and it makes me wonder what would happen to her if she were to walk through a forest? I suppose she'd just spontaneously combust with desire, or something.

Anyway… I wanted to wish both of my readers (or am I down to just one?) a very Merry Christmas from all of us at Smoot Central. We'll be dreaming of a white Christmas, although in our case we're thinking more along the lines of white sandy beaches. For something different this year, we're heading to Florida to depart on a Caribbean cruise (visiting Grand Cayman, Costa Maya and Cozumel) this coming week. I'll be back with more inane drivel and travel stories when we return. Feliz Navidad!