Get Used to It

Who is that woman at the concert screaming the lyrics the entire time? Why, it's me!

Brandon and I are going to see They Might Be Giants tonight. Concerts seem to me to be close to the platonic ideal of a good time in that they combine many things I love: singing, beer, dancing of the vaguely dirty kind. As a bonus, They Might Be Giants tends to perform songs under five minutes long. I'm not a fan of the "jam."

(Brandon used to be in a band, Baaba Seth that, while very good and enjoyable, could spend, like, twenty minutes on one song. All right, guys. My beer's getting warm and I apparently didn't warm up properly. Can we get back to the chorus?)

Anyway, I'm excited about this upcoming pleasure. Research--that is, psychologists--has found that we tend to habituate to any given pleasure so, in order to increase the pleasure, we should try to spread out pleasurable experiences. In other words, if I went to a concert every night, I probably wouldn't enjoy it as much. It's the old everything-in-moderation argument.

It's likely a good idea and dovetails nicely with the parenthood lifestyle. But what I find more pleasurable than one beer at a concert? Downing one beer, then ordering another quickly before it's time to start my audience singing again.