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Wednesday, November 15, 2006

016: Hamster Brain

My friend Janet is a frequent victim of "hamster brain" -- those times when your thoughts keep running and running, like a hamster in a wheel, usually when you're trying to get to sleep. She and Leslie, also a sufferer of this dread condition, often sign off phone conversations with, "Death to hamsters!" Les mentioned this once to our friend Karen, who's got a two-year-old, Miranda. And Karen said, "Miranda has a birthday card with a hamster on it. She likes the hamster."

And that is how this song came to be.

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Hamster Brain
Words and Music © 2006 by Tom Smith
Released under a Creative Commons Noncommercial ShareAlike License


Three o'clock in the morning and I can't frickin' sleep.
I've tried showers, music, milk and cookies, wine and counting sheep.
But a zillion little random thoughts are driving me insane,
It's like hamsters on a wheel running right inside my brain.

Death to hamsters, death to hamsters,
Death to hamsters except for Miranda's
Death to hamsters, death to hamsters,
Except Miranda's 'cause she has one as a pet.

I'm not crazy, suicidal, overworked or overstressed,
It's just when I start to think of stuff I can't give it a rest,
And it rattles shakes and rumbles from the moment I disrobe,
I don't want a frickin' habitrail inside my frontal lobe.

Death to hamsters, death to hamsters,
Death to hamsters except for Miranda's
Death to hamsters, death to hamsters,
Except Miranda's 'cause she has one as a pet.

I told my little niece Miranda,
About the hamsters who keep me up all night
And she cried and said, "Please don't hurt them,
It's not their fault, you haven't got the right"
So I've written New Age hamster music,
Put Hamster Sominex inside a bedside cup,
Even tried some hamster hypnosis,
I'll take a mallet to my mullet if they won't... shut... up!

Then one night I couldn't take it, and I sat up in my bed,
Grabbed the mallet, started playing Whack-A-Hamster on my head.
And I'm so sorry, Miranda, I was mean and I was weak...
But lemme tell ya, it's adorable -- you hit 'em and they squeak.

Death to hamsters, death to hamsters,
Death to hamsters except for Miranda's
Death to hamsters, death to hamsters,
Except Miranda's 'cause she has one as a pet.
So I don't think that I'll mention it just yet.

6 Comments:

At 10:45 AM, Blogger Sierra Starsong said...

I wonder if this is how Weasel Stomping Day got started...

 
At 11:41 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ooo! Ooo! Mary will just adore this (when she gets over the killer jet-lag of returning home from Kenya tomorrow). I often have to use the self-hypnosis techniques my late mom taught me to help my poor Songbird "get th damned hamster off her wheel" and get to sleep. As for me, I kill my hamsters with drugs (thank God and my doctor for Trazodone!).

 
At 2:11 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Celestial Seasonings' Sleepy Time tea always does the trick for me... woo, rhyme! I used to think it was a little hamster on the box, then my fiance pointed out that it was a bear..

Anyway, adorable, twisted, highly amusing.

 
At 3:21 PM, Blogger filkertom said...

Anon -- hee. Reminds me of an old Duck's Breath Radio Mystery Theater bit about Sleepytime Tea, or something like that, with the slogan, "Look for me, the Unconscious Bear, in fine drug stores everywhere."

 
At 7:10 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sounds like me more often than not.

*starts plotting hamster death*

Another good song there Tom.

*starts disseminating*

 
At 2:09 AM, Blogger Garrett said...

Oooh, now I know where those bruises on my forehead when I wake up come from....

 

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