More or Less Bunk, Part V: Any Other Name

...continued from the previous post... and also... spoiler alert... there just might be a contest at the end...

By New Year’s, the Camry's persistent anonymosity had crossed a line. Even my Lady – who to this day has still not made the full return from Crazy Town – kept asking if the New Car had a name. So on January 9, I bit the bullet: On the Pike, full steam ahead, radio on.

(What? We’re about to launch into a discussion of song lyrics, for crying out loud, and I’m not allowed to use a few shorthand clichés? Please. Moon! June! Spoon! Tune! Loon! So there! Don’t tell me what literary devices I can’t use. Nyeah!)

Now, you’re probably thinking this is going to be easy. You’re probably thinking that as soon as the first real-name, gender-appropriate song comes on the radio, I will be done. And you may have gotten that impression because it’s more or less exactly what I said. But it’s not true. I lied, okay? I cheat, all right? Seriously, after all these years, does that surprise you?

Hell. If old Alice (remember Alice?) didn’t tip you off to my full-of-it-ness, then what will? I mean, come on: the only way “Alice’s Restaurant” will ever be the first song you hear on the radio is if you turn the key at noontime on Thanksgiving -- and this wasn't anywhere near close to that. It was the spring, like I said, of 1990. The immediate options at my disposal were basically Greta Garbo, Ann Monroe, Dietrich or Dimaggio – and I already told you that my poo-brown Buick was a boy. A straight boy. (And please don’t go suggesting “Joe” in honor of the Yankee Clipper, because first of all, Yankee, hello! And secondly he was a Regal, not a pick-up truck, for heaven’s sake!). So I waited (and waded) through “Cherry Pie,” “Poison” and the Humpty Dance, until I made my way to the left end of the dial, where I got bored, heard “Alice,” and decided if it was good enough for Mr. Cooper it was good enough for me.

Same thing happened this time, too, except I’ve taken too long to get to this point in the story and have now forgotten all but one of the songs I heard and rejected on the Pike. That's still better than the last time: I don’t remember any of the songs from 1990 – I lied about them, too. And what I’m about to do now, you see, is cheat.

I played a little game on facebook – got people to turn on their radios and tell me what they heard, then combed through all those ideas for lady-names. I know some of you cheated – there’s just no way Patti Smith’s “Horses” was the first song on anybody’s random airwaves in 2010, even in England; plus I’m not sure if Pandora ought to count – but still. Even this was harder than it looks. I got sixteen suggestions (counting cheaters), and only managed to make two of them work.

So on the list that follows, only one of the four songs comes from that bullet-biting drive. Two come from facebook friend suggestions, and one I just made up. See if you can figure out which ones are which!

Ahem...

Bernice might have worked, if I hadn’t made a rule up on the spot that says namesakes can’t be bad guys unless they’re really, really bitchin’ antiheroes – like the Jackal, Superfly, or Leroy Brown. And I’m sorry, but some random redhead your boyfriend got caught snogging in the parking lot just doesn’t count.

Couldn’t be Abigail for two reasons: 1. I happen to care very deeply about a flesh-and-blood person named Abigail, so I wouldn’t feel right implementing the sort of verbal discipline that so often becomes necessary with a car, 2. Everybody knows Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time, and 3. (I lied again; so sue me) What is up with all these second-fiddle redheads, anyhow?

No way was I going to name her “Brandy.” A good wife she might be, but a fine girl this tea-green Camry is most definitely not.

And Sleepy Jean just sounded like a bad idea all around.

But then it happened.

Doo dee doo dooooo doo dee doo...

It's not a girl’s name as intended in the song, exactly, but it most certainly is one in real life. A trifle dusty, yes, but at least the Golden Girl it belonged to was my favorite Golden Girl. And the idea it expresses here is cynically appropriate, because no matter how sweet-smelling the New Car may be now, she is still my car...

And so you know she's gonna fuck me in the end.

Oh come on, people! You're not going to make me say it, are you? The name ought to be obvious enough by now, but if one of you kind folks out there can find it in your hearts to spare me from from having to say out loud the title of the song I named her for, I will write the final installment of this series in rhyming verse. Rhyming verse that incorporates your name -- and whatever other personal details about you that I know or am willing to make up -- in some patently witty and clever fashion.

Yes, Donna! It's a contest! An easy one, because it's been a while.

But no cheating. It's my blog. And I'm the only one who can get away with that.