Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Going out of my Abba mind

Every day, Thomas has to listen to Abba while doing school.

Every day. Every single stinking day.

No other CD will do. I have tried to introduce him to new music. I got out my CD folder labeled "mellow" and started putting CDs in. We've listened to John Denver, Willie Nelson's Stardust, Bread, America, BeeGees...yuck to all.

We used to listen to classical music, but Thomas hated that. We quit. I actually got a Mozart CD out and slipped it in instead of Abba. He didn't like that one bit.

Last week I snuck in a George Gershwin Rhapsody in Blue CD. He listened, and I told him it was one of my favorite songs because it told a story with no words. He looked at me as if I was crazy. When the song had played twice (I put it on repeat--if he can repeat Waterloo, by golly I can repeat Rhapsody in Blue) he got up, pulled the disk and put Abba in.

And played it.

For the millionth time.

Abba, Abba, Abba.

I know all the songs by heart. I dream about the songs. Heck, I have nightmares about the songs.

Why Abba?

For Pete's sake, I like Abba, but I think I've had enough to last me a lifetime.

When Bob comes home for lunch, the first thing out of his mouth after hello is, "Abba, again?"

Yeah, Abba. Again.

Thomas wants another Abba CD, one with the songs that he knows that aren't on this CD. Thanks, You Tube. Thanks a lot. I am not looking forward to Ring, Ring.

But being the mom I am, I don't complain in front of Thomas. Instead I let it fester inside. I might tease him a bit (I am a gentle teaser, I think teasing can quickly become mean, so I'm mindful.)

He has always hated music. He's been exposed to music his whole life. I find it so odd, because Bob and I have always loved music. I like about anything except country, but I'll even listen to some country. When I was a teenager, I had every Kenny Rogers record there was. What was I thinking? I had other stuff, though. I didn't listen to Kenny Rogers day after day after day.

Interruption of my blog post: Thomas just informed me, right this second, that he thinks we should get another Abba album, so he can hear things like Eagle and Ring Ring.

Mom bangs her head on the table.

When Thomas was a toddler, he hated music. We'd go to a little kid event, and all the kids would be dancing in the aisle to the silly music, but not Thomas. It was so beneath him.

The only good thing I have to say about Abba is that Thomas, for the first time in his life, will SING. He sings Abba songs on almost a daily basis. That is music to a mother's ears.

However, I am still sick of Abba.

I'm thinking of getting myself an iPod shuffle so I can listen to other stuff while he listens to Abba.

And speaking of iPods, that great stereo I bought (aside from playing Abba 90% of the time) has been wonderful. We have just about finished up our SOTW disks. And I discovered I didn't need to buy an iPod for the thing, because it has an iPod docking station. I went to Radio Shack and bought a plug-in for $5 and we can play our Creative Zen on the stereo. That was big for me because I didn't have to come up with money for a more expensive iPod. Whew. I can pick up a Shuffle for $49 at Wal-Mart. That just may save my sanity.

So here we sit, listening to Abba, doing school and now the neighbor starts up his leaf blower on the vacuum setting and he's vacuuming the street again. He does this every other day. Still.

I really need a Shuffle.

I think I've posted about Abba before. Ad nauseum. I probably will again. Sheesh.

7 comments:

samuel said...

I'm so glad I don't own any Abba, but honestly I wouldn't and wouldn't introduce my kids to it. My oldest has, the last couple of times he played anything, put in Monty Python Sings. I used to play it for him once in a while and skip over a couple of songs, the penis song as well as the song about VD's because they just don't seem appropriate. I skipped another song because it's just so mind achingly stupid. Of course skipping doesn't help if you aren't there to skip, and I'd forgotten about the songs till recently when he played the cd again and I heard them. Oh well! He was bound to hear them eventually.

Oh, and I'm sorry about your Abba issues. It's almost funny, but I feel that if I laugh I will pay some karmic retribution.

Frankie said...

Sam, I give you permission to laugh. While it drives me insane, to the point I want to literally pound my head on the wall, I DO see the humor in it. Really, I do. It's funny and torture at the same time. lol

If you ever send your on off to camp, he'll come home singing worse than you can imagine. While Thomas didn't really sing the songs, he told me the words -- and it made the hair on my neck stand up.

So yeah, they learn stuff. I almost feel it's safer for them to learn it at home, at least we can explain things.

I've never heard the penis song, or the VD song, so when T goes to bed, I may just look for them online. Just doing research, of course. ;-)

Elisheva Hannah Levin said...

My kids both have gone on these kind of inexplicable fads.
Thank goodness, no ABBA.
But the Chem Geek Princess listened to Raffi over and over . . . and over and over . . . and over . . . until I thought that if I heard Baby Beluga one more time I was going to take my geology hammer to the tape player.

Yes. That was in the days of cassettes.

At least the Boychick has the good taste to be obssessed with RUSH and Iron Butterfly.

Meg_L said...

In our house it was Weird Al.

I like Weird Al, but over and over and over......

Garden State Kate said...

Stardust...I LOVE that album..it has
my favorite song of all time..
"Moonlight in Vermont".
I like ABBA..once in a while.
P has just gotten over her Bon Jovi kick, so I feel your pain.
;-)

rae said...

Count your lucky stars, Frankie. At least it's not the newest mis-guided teen gracing your ears. I've got Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana drumming my head anytime I let my girls choose their own music.

Unknown said...

We just bought Squirrel a radio for her birthday. This was to save her brothers from listening to Barney one more time. Yes she is 7 and still loves Barney. I think that it is the simplicity of the songs that she enjoys. Every night and every morning you can hear her radio. She loves falling asleep to a relaxing lullaby cd.

I have tried to listen to classical, jazz and even nature sounds while doing school work. No one likes it but me. The kids prefer to have audio books in the background, but I just cannot do it.