The Prude Drags Herself (and you) Through the '60's

The Prude, while visiting some dear friends last evening, had a revelation. She is Wordy. Very very wordy. So very wordy that she is fighting the temptation to check her online Thesaurus to find synonyms for ‘wordy’. ‘VERBOSE’ jumps off the screen and slaps Your Prude around a bit. (she didn’t fight the temptation with much gusto)

Proof of her wordiness: the evaluation of Trifling Tunes was to be a one-day post. It is on it’s 3rd day. Those of you not enamored with musical retrospectives, stick with me. We should be done by tomorrow.  Or sooner, given The Prude’s miniscule attention span.

Without further ado, let’s examine Trifling Tunes of the 1960’s.
(Part of The Prude’s verbosity could stem from her penchant for long, long lead-ins to her posts)

No one song can portray the cataclysmic madcap era that was the 60’s. So we will peruse several and Your Prude will tell you where they lead.

FIRST, as promised yesterday, we’ll examine the multiculturalism that was beginning to flex its muscles. ‘On Top of Spaghetti’ (along with its minor theme extolling the benefits of sneezing into one’s sleeve) demonstrates the willingness of the USA to put that whole Mussolini thing behind us and embrace our Italian citizens and their contributions to our national cuisine.

More subtle, but still indicative, is ‘Snoopy and the Red Baron’. Our willingness to poke gentle fun at Germany proved that we really did believe that they had changed this time and were not planning to ignite WWIII.

And of course, ‘Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (A Letter From Camp)’ demonstrated unabashed pride in the Bronx dialect.


SECOND, the following poignant lyrics are from a song called, appropriately, ‘Let It All Hang Out’

It's rainin' inside a big brown moon
How does that mess you baby up, leg (take note of this ‘random’ word- we’ll come back to it)
Eatin' a Reuben sandwich with sauerkraut (which validates the German multiculturalism in 'FIRST' above)
Don't stop now, baby, let it all hang out

It does not take a huge leap of logic to get from Point A (letting it all hang out) to Point B ( the present gentlemen’s style of pants which requires a belt at mid-thigh instead of mid-waist, and an inseam that begins slightly below the knee) The random use of the word ‘leg’ in line 2 is the obvious connection between A and B.

Your Prude is running out of steam. There was going to be a THIRD but even with song titles such as ‘My Boomerang Won’t Come Back’ ‘Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport’, ‘The Ballad of Irving’ and ‘A Boy Named Sue’ she has lost her vision.

We can only wait until tomorrow to see if she can work up enough wit and wisdom to evaluate the songs of the next few decades. In the meantime, come tiptoe through the tulips. With me.