The wife and I were in Tucson, AZ, recently, visiting family, and apparently the
4th Avenue Fair was the place to be that weekend. With the wife's mother, we headed over.
It was more or less what you'd expect from a street fair. There were stalls, art, artisans, jewelry, crafts, hawkers, water-beers, gifts, foodstuffs, and the occasional free sample. Some items were nice, some were tacky. Some things were tasty, some didn't look like they would be.
Also, there was live music.
We'd wound around half of the fair, the stretch of stalls south of 6th Street, and we were crossing 6th to check out the other half, on the north side. We were flagging a little by then, and we could hear music outside a cafe on the corner. We were walking toward it, and it didn't sound bad. What reached us was kind of a zydeco-sound thing. I say that without really knowing what zydeco is, but it was uptempo guitar and accordion and if I had to compare it to something, Paul Simon's "That Was Your Mother" would pop to mind.
When we crossed the street, we saw that it was a kid playing. I spend no time with children (so I'm awful at estimating these things), but let's say he was 10-12 years old. The guitar part was pre-recorded, and he was standing alone at a mic playing one of those small push-button accordions. The kid looked uncomfortable. He looked down, didn't make eye contact with the crowd, and when he moved it was uncertain and awkward. If it's possible to shuffle while playing a small push-button accordion along to pre-recorded uptempo guitar music, he would've been shuffling. Uncomfortably. He may have been dressed like a little cowboy, or that could be how people dress in Tucson. We all agreed, non-verbally, to stand and watch for a bit.
He started to sing.
We guessed the name of the song was "Don't Mess With My Toot Toot," since that was the only lyric, repeated over and over. Then back to the accordion. Then back to singing, the same lyric, over and over (again). And it wasn't just that all he could sing was, "Don't mess with my toot toot." It was also how he sang. There was a long slide up to the first note, in pitch and volume, which extended that first word and gave the line a keening wail, an urgency. And he did it every. single. time.
"Dooooon't mess with my toot toot."
"Dooooon't mess with my toot toot."As if he were trying to tell us something.
"Dooooon't mess with my toot toot."
"Dooooon't mess with my toot toot."As if somebody was messing with his toot toot, possibly on a regular basis, and he wanted them to stop.
Horrible, right? So we couldn't laugh right there, of course. The wife's mother wasn't noticing it at all, for one thing, and who knows what further damage we'd cause the kid if we fell down laughing in front of him. The wife and I were reduced to wide-eyed looks and whispers (
Are you seeing this, and what the hell's happening to that kid?) and generally trying not to giggle.
It was our favorite thing for days afterwards. Going to sleep that night, the house was quiet -- "Dooooon't mess with my toot toot." Laughter. To the family dogs we were visiting, "Now when you go to the dog park... don't let anybody mess with your toot toot." Any lapse in conversation. You get the idea.
It remains infinitely hilarious and disturbing. All we have to do now is sing or even hum that first smear of pitch, pleadingly.
The wife and I have talked about how we're able to keep the stupidest imaginable jokes around for years. It's probably a good thing we found each other.
Addendum: While writing this I learned that "My Toot Toot" is a real zydeco hit (and Grammy winner), originally recorded by
Rockin' Sidney in the mid-80s, that's since been "much covered." Plus, there's an answer to the question, what the hell's meant by "toot toot" exactly? According to
Wikipedia, it's a triple entendre covering drugs and sex "while its real meaning was a Cajun term of endearment meaning sweet heart, as in 'mà chere tout-tout.'" So yes, it was completely inappropriate for that kid.
(As a note to parents, please do not let your zydeco-interested children cover "My Toot Toot," because it's filthy and wrong. Unless you find it as funny as we do, in which case... Go find that tyke a street corner.)
Now I wish we'd stuck around to see if that kid could play the Rockin' Sidney follow-up, "Don't Mess With My Tush." Alas, we'll never know.
