The Sting That Haunts

Not sure if I've written about this before, but there's a shoeshine guy outside my building who yells at passers-by all day. His favorite thing to yell is "Pride! You've got to have pride!" as though he can shame people into getting their shoes shined.

I'm on the fourth floor and just around the corner from him, but I hear it clearly every day. It's annoying.

But today was worse.

I admire street musicians who just sit somewhere and play and play and play, hoping for handouts. That's rough. But a guy showed up today on the corner below my window with a keyboard. Not a little casio thing, but a big, 88-key monster, and began playing. Loudly. It was louder than the music on my computer.

At first, I thought, "How novel, a keyboard player." He did some ragtime, some jazz (including a decent Herbie Hancock cover), then settled into The Entertainer, the Scott Joplin tune best known from the Sting.

Don't get me wrong. I like the Entertainer. I love the Sting. But three hours later, I don't ever want to hear that song again.

The shoe shine guy is quiet when he has a customer. Money only encouraged the Keyboardist from Hell.

I never realized before, but if you're playing for pedestrians, you really only need one song. I sometimes think, oh, that'd be kind of cool, but I don't know that many songs on the guitar to play for hours. But hell, I know one song. I know a few. I could have a whole set.

People often play in the train station by my office. I never thought about it before, but I bet the station agents have to endure the same song all day. I couldn't take another day of this. If he comes back next week, I may have to work somewhere else.