Bad Influences

One of many new experiences I've had from the culture shock of working in a DC kitchen has been regular exposure to rap music by way of a communal iPod player. I've never much cared for the stuff myself, but hearing it day in and day out, I can't help but come to appreciate some of it.

I'd heard plenty about 50 Cent, for instance, and had in fact heard several of his songs here and there, without knowing it was him.

I mean, "In Da Club" was frocking inescapable, both in the sense that the song was everywhere, and that it stays in your head like it's supposed to:



Similarly, I've heard Pitbull's "I Know I Know You Want Me" at bars and clubs, but now that I know what it actually is, I actually kinda really dig it in a guilty pleasure way:



I like this stuff in spite of myself, but bad influences are a two way street. A couple days ago I asked to switch to a Pandora station of something I wanted to listen to. This included some heavy metal:



I thought that would be the end of it, but no! Today one of the other cooks sought out a heavy metal station entirely on his own:



And suddenly I was air guitaring, transported back to my high school bedroom and 18 years old again.

There's not much else to say, except perhaps that I hope I'm a little less snobby about music than I used to be.