Music to eat your own ears to. And repeat

I am not happy.

I am on edge.

My shoulders are tight, my teeth are clenched, and I’m developing a rather fetching twitch in my right eye.

The reason? Music.

Original picture: Prawny, Pixabay

Ah, music, the soother of souls, the up-lifter of hearts, a sympathetic companion in a crisis, a welcome friend during celebrations.

Except when it’s not.

Because sometimes music can turn against you.

Sometimes music can make you want to tear your hair out, fill your ears with concrete, stuff your head into a kettle drum and run repeatedly at the nearest wall; just ask any poor half-demented sales assistant who has to listen to, ‘Jingle Bells’, on repeat from September to December every year. Music can drive you insane. (Of course, this particular seasonal affliction doesn’t affect me because TBE – aka The Boss Erratic - is simply not organised enough: see ‘TBE’s faultless Christmas planning, Part Two’).

No, the source of my musical pain is the Out Of Favour shop CD player, which, judging by its tinny musical output and teeth-grindingly annoying performance issues, TBE clearly bought from a dodgy bloke in a backstreet pub using pretend money and her well-past-their-sell-by-date girlish wiles.

TBE's girlish wiles. Irresistible.
Photo: Cuyahoga, Pixabay

(Top tip about TBE: she’s never knowingly a purchaser of quality when she can buy crap for half the price. Remember that if you ever come into the shop).

The CD player jumps. Repeatedly.

And it’s turning me slowly batty.

Every morning things start perfectly well. The CD player acts normally and I forget about it. But it’s a false nirvana. Because about four songs in it all starts to go wrong.

It jumps. Once, twice, three times. I wonder whether to fiddle with it, but it starts to play normally again. So I leave it, foolishly assuming that the crisis is over.

Ten minutes later it jumps again. Then it skips. Then stops altogether. Then starts. Then plays for half a song then stop again. Then starts. Over and over again.

All. Sodding. Day.

Original picture: OpenClipart-Vectors, Pixabay

I want to rip out the CD player and hurl it at the wall. I want to rip my ears off and run around yelling until my lungs burst and my head falls off.

Instead I go through the tedious and ultimately futile steps I always do:

Press, ‘stop’.

Press ‘play’.

Swear.

Turn the CD player off.

Turn it on again.

Swear.

Take the disc out,

Resist the urge to snap it in two.

Rub it on my trouser leg.

Glare at it menacingly.

Put it back in and press ‘play’.

Swear quite a lot.

Swear some more.

And don’t think trying another disc helps. It doesn’t. It’s exactly the same.

This has been going on for months now.

Of course, the simple solution would be to buy another CD player. Or, more specifically, for TBE to buy another CD player. So, of course, that’s not going to happen.

Instead, I spend my days alternately staring blankly at customers as I watch their mouths move, having taken the decision never to hear anything inside the shop ever again, and screaming muffled obscenities into handfuls of cheap acrylic scarves.

Happy days.