Too Much Hanky-Panky In the Workplace

Seriously, I work at a retail store.  I was there all night . . . with two other women . . . in different corners of the building.  You would think there would be no better environment for intense concentration and productivity.  But I reckoned without the music being piped in through the speaker system.

Personally, I prefer to have music while I work.  It usually keeps me awake and makes the time pass more pleasantly.  But, as of yesterday, they've started throwing in a few Christmas tunes with the regular pop assortment.  I don't mind Christmas music, and I have been known to play it out of season while working on Christmas projects.  A little Adeste Fidelis or First Noel gives me warm fuzzy feelings.  However, there are several selections I absolutely detest (Jingle Bell Rock, Run Run Rudolph, By Gosh By Golly, Frosty the Snowman, to name just a few), and unfortunately that seems to be all the store is going to play.  Just to make it ten times worse, they only play the jazzed-up modern covers, which frankly sound more ridiculous than the originals.

BUT, I will listen to Frosty all day long if I could tune out the "adult themed" carols.  I know practically all songs are love songs, and they usually aren't singing about having some cocoa and watching TV.  But if I have to hear the "extra sexy" version of Baby, It's Cold Outside every work day for the next six weeks, I may have to start slapping people.  It's like being trapped in a closet with two people getting hot and heavy on the other side of the door.  You don't want to listen, but you don't have much choice.  Besides that, the whole premise of the song is one selfish bastard trying to get what he wants in spite of his lady friend's better judgment (after quite possibly slipping her a rufie), and that bothers me.

Maybe I'm over-thinking it, but it made it very difficult to work.  It didn't help that the woman's voice sounded vaguely like a case of tinnitus.  I'm trying to count holes in the pegboard to set planograms, and I had to start counting out loud.  Reprieve was brief, as the musical canoodlers were soon followed by THREE (count them) different versions of Merry Christmas, Baby, which to me sounds a lot like "Thanks, babe, for buying me all this expensive stuff (and probably providing other services), and letting me crash on your couch, because I'm probably a deadbeat leach." That also bothered me.

But, the coup de grace, and probably a new low for the whole genre of Christmas music, was Backdoor Santa.  Basically, in almost as many words, this guy who considers himself some kind of sex god goes sneaking around through backdoors "when the other boys are out" pleasuring all the women of the neighborhood who love it so much they call him "Backdoor Santa."  Oh, and he bribes the children of these households with loose change to leave him and mom alone.  The sleeze meter was maxed out.

This is as fabric store!  Little old ladies shop here!  Who picks out this music, and what's wrong with them?!