WeblogPoMo 2024 - Song 4: The Proclaimers - I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)

I just met this girl a couple hours ago, and she’s clearly the coolest girl I’ve ever met.

One of the very first things she asked me after we met was if I wanted to see a magic trick.

She presents a deck of cards and asks me to pick a card.

Yes, she ultimately revealed my card.

Yes, it blew me away.

We start talking about Four Loko, which had recently been banned across the country. After doing a favor for a friend who paid me with a cardboard box filled with various malt liquors, I mentioned to her that I have some of the real stuff in my trunk.

I did have to warn her, though, that it was expired and had been sitting in the trunk for at least a couple days.

She didn’t care. We each grabbed one and slammed them.

After a couple more drinks, we decide to walk to Blarney’s, a bar that’s not too far from the Dinkytown home of our mutual friend whose sidewalk is now covered in shotgunned Four Loko runoff.

This was a random Thursday night in December. We both had stuff to do early the next morning. I had to film something for my internship. She needed to drive back to Wisconsin for a job interview.

But Blarney’s had exceptionally cheap Long Island Iced Teas.

And there was karaoke.

I don’t recall what she sang that night. I was too infatuated by her “who would win in an animal fight” discussion, of which you could tell she clearly had deeply considered these outcomes already.

I do remember trying to decide what I was going to sing. I was clearly confident, fueled by a potent combination of Four Loko, Long Islands, and love.

But I needed something I knew I could nail in front of a crowd.

So I chose I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles).

For this girl, for this moment, it just felt right.

I did end up making it to my shoot the next morning. I couldn’t get the eye liner off my face that the girl talked me into applying later that evening, so you can clearly see it in the B-roll footage that I acted in.

She slept through that job interview. She seemed to not mind it too much, though, since she ended up marrying me.

This reminds me, I really aught to sing it to her again sometime soon.

It’s just hard to find date night opportunities with your wife when you’ve got two rambunctious kids running around.

That, and the karaoke scene here south of the river is sus. Find me a place nearby where I can do Rap God without censorship, you cowards.