159. Fresh Meat

159. "Everything Works If You Let It" by Cheap Trick

When I was working at BYU-Idaho, I was pretty happy for the first year and a half in my work. But then the bosses started making some pretty stupid rules about how we had to build online courses, some of which I believed I could not support and still uphold my professional code of ethics. At about this time, I also was told by my doctor that I had insulin resistance, and if I didn't want to get diabetes, I'd better go on a very low-carb diet and loose a lot of weight. This added to my discouragement, as eating food was (and still is) a main way that I deal with stress and depression. It was tough finding things that tasted good that I could eat, and my first few trips to the grocery store were so frustrating that several times I just walked out of the store without buying a damn thing. But I was determined to do what the doctor said, so I kept scrounging for low-carb foods until I found where they were all hidden. I also started walking and running around the indoor track that the university had just built. My goal was to walk or run at least an hour each day. To help keep my mood up during that hour of going in counter-clockwise circles, I splurged on some new digital downloads to my iTunes playlist. "Everything Works If You Let It" was one of those new tracks. I found the lyrics gave me hope that things could get better, more than any church hymn could. It also had the added benefit of injecting enough energy into my brain to motivate me to run a half-mile at a pretty good clip. I'd stretch and walk during the slow acoustic opening, and then accelerate into 6-minute mile (or less) pace as the bass guitar line began. After running to this song, I would think, "Yes! Everything WILL work out if I let it! I'll keep working really hard, and just trust that in the end the bosses will see the wisdom in practicing ethical instructional design! Now, it's time to go home and have me one of those 6-carb fudge-cicles."



After a year of working out to this song and sticking to my ethical principles, my bosses finally came around to my way of thinking about the ethical problems with their decisions. Shortly thereafter, I got a promotion, a $10,000 a year pay raise, and both written and verbal recognition from the university administration that my work had made a significant impact on the ability of the university to provide more students with a better education at a substantially lower cost. My insulin resistance disappeared, and with continued dieting and exercise, I kept off all of the 60+ pounds that I lost. The store I shopped at started stocking 17 new delicious Ben and Jerry's ice cream products with 0 carbs. My depression reversed itself, and I became happier and more content with my life than ever before. See, Cheap Trick was right! Everything WILL work out if you let it!

After reading the paragraph above, it may seem like this song was specially sent to earth by rock 'n roll angels to ensure I'd have an awesome life. But it wasn't. Not at all. Not even a little bit. Why? Because everything I wrote in that last paragraph was a big, fat, stinking lie. What really happened to me was the exact opposite. Cheap Trick was wrong. Everything will NOT work out if you let it. Everything will turn to crap no matter what you do. But even though my life is now a 24-hours-a-day skinny-dip in a bottomless pool of cynicism and hopelessness. I still like listening to the song and enjoy my memories of cruising around the indoor track at top speed to this awesome arena rock song.

Cheap Trick didn't write the song as a pick-me-up message of hope anyway. They wrote this song so they'd get some greenbacks every time someone watched the opening and closing credits of the 1980 movie "Roadie."




If you want to watch the full movie on YouTube, it's been recently pirated at the YouTube page below. But I don't recommend that you watch it in its entirety that way. It's got an annoying, persistent white glare in the middle of the screen through the whole movie. Most likely, it's there to thwart YouTube's efforts to identify and eliminate pirated videos. I say that if you're going to watch "Roadie," you'll want to get the Blu-Ray High Definition Wide Screen Director's Cut so that you can see Meat Loaf in all his long-haired glory. This was his first feature film, which means his acting will be farm fresh and free from any type of clichéd performance. Also, the movie is just a bit shy of the 90-minute mark, so there is very little chance that you'll tire of seeing him on screen. By the way, 90 minutes is enough time to cook and consume two full-sized meatloafs with all the fixin's, so it's an excellent choice for dinner-date movie.

WARNING! The opening credits feature a shortened, double-time version of "Everything Works If You Let It." If you do watch the first 2 minutes and 15 seconds of the movie, don't turn right around and listen to the full length version of the song that I posted above. Compared to the movie version, the full-length version will seem like it's being played at a snail's pace. And while I don't have anything against snails in particular, I prefer to think of this song as a fast ride. Why? Because, dammit! Meat is a man of action! Now, here's the link to the movie, just in case you can't resist taking a peek.

https://youtu.be/ZVOM7xCkz_g

Yes, indeed! Meat Loaf IS a man of action! His sensitive performance of a young hero from Texas reminded me of another young actor that would eventually play the greatest Texan hero of all time. That's right, I'm talking about...

Young Chuck Norris!

Okay, I admit that was a pretty long stretch to get to an excuse to watch the Young Chuck Norris video. But it was totally worth it. Right?! And I'll never apologize for Norrisizing any of my Top 200 posts, because Young Chuck Norris would never say he's sorry. He'd round-house kick you in the face and then break three ribs with a karate punch to your heart before locking in a death-hold grip on your throat and crushing your larynx so you can't cry for help while your life comes to a painful, terrifying end.

Coincidentally, that's exactly what I wanted to do to my bosses when I got fired. Hopefully, that'll work out for me someday.