If you ever want to read a snappy blog about the world of an orchestra musician, you should check out the wonderful Inside the Classics which is written by my friends Sam (that’s CrotchetyOriginal, FYI) and Sarah. ItC is a friendly and informative blog that covers both the ins and outs of the orchestra biz (in this case the Minnesota Orchestra biz), and whatever fanciful little internet things that captures their attention. Basically, Inside the Classics is just like The Willful Caboose only instead of hockey, they write about music, and instead of inane nonsense, their blog is full of smart ideas and keen observations.
Today I was visiting Inside the Classics when I was introduced to the Helsinki Complaints Choir. The Helsinki Complaints choir is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. It’s a choir that sings a laundry list of complaints. I love them.
Because the song mentions hockey twice I think this clip belongs here, on my hockey blog.
The whole song has a very chipper tone in spite of the subject matter, and it is in this spirit that I would like to submit my own complaint to add to this song.
The last person who painted my house took ZERO care while painting around the windows, and as a result almost all of my windows look like this:
Many of the windows have paint like this on BOTH sides of the pane. Inside and out.
The good news is that it’s an easy fix (I bought this little scrappy razor blade thingie at Home Despot), but honestly. Is it really THAT hard to paint a window? I don’t have time for this kind of bullhonky, which is why this window still looks like this a month after moving into my new house.
Tomorrow we’ll resume our usual hockey yammering. I promise.
Is it really THAT hard to paint a window?
They apparently missed Step 1: tape window before applying paint. What would make it even sadder is if it was done by a professional painter.
Note to self when buying next house: insist that the seller scrape the window glass clean before closing. Ergh…what a pain!
P.S. The complainy choir? Awesome.
Aww, thanks for the plug! (Although now I feel like I need to go back into our archives and insert with a few smart ideas and keen observations, just in case anyone goes looking for the ones you mentioned.) I love the complaint choir, and if you run a YouTube search, you’ll find that there are more of them in cities across Europe. I think it started in Birmingham, England. The Finns are by far the best, though.
No actual adult painted that window. That was a project to occupy a group of third-graders on a snow day.
Hee, I like calling it “Home Despot” too.
And Eurovision is WEIRD. I think losing might be a good thing.
OK, every time I’ve told you do don’t need to tape to paint, I want to make it clear that I did mean that you shouldn’t tape the windows. :D
(I do love the view, though! It looks so cozy!)
By the way, the Finns actually DID win Eurovision a year or two after the Complaint Choir song was recorded. If memory serves, the group that won was a thrash metal band that dresses up in monster costumes to perform.
Great! Now the chorus is stuck in my head!
:D
This choir is fantastic. Thank you for sharing this!
Oh and Kathleen, Eurovision is indeed weird, but it’s the best TV show ever. It’s hilarious!
I like going into Lowes and calling it “Lowes Depot” when being helped by one of the employees. I learned this from my brother, Wade. He once said “Lowes Depot” so many times that the Lowes worker got frustrated and said “It’s just Lowes, sir.”