Yes Satriani fans, that there was a blatant ripoff of one of my favorite songs of his.

Now that’s out of the way, I just smelled something that brought me back to my old marching band days with the high school band. The odor-bearing subject I speak of is my polyester Chuck Taylor hoodie. I’ve worn it over a wifebeater (the “A-shirt” as Hanes likes to call it) on many a chilly night now exposing it to my bare, hairy underarm regions. After repeated exposure to my pits, it seems to have adopted their musky funk, causing multiple odiferous flashbacks to my old marching band days in high school. It’s weirding me out and opening cans of worms I wasn’t aware my memory still contained.

Back in high school when we had to play parades, we were forced to wear the standard issue Park High marching band uniform. All 100% breathable (ha ha) polyester white and green eyesores that were about as comfortable as using sandpaper on your boompah after going number 2 in the potty. Not that I ever have… I’m just trying to use some imagery to get my point across.

These uniforms, no matter how many dry cleanings they’d endured, carried not only incredible lack of visual appeal, but also a rather subtle cloud of B.O. – even in the non-armpit/undercarriage areas. And it wasn’t just my B.O. – oh no. These uniforms had been around a good 5-6 years prior to my tenure with the marching band which means they carried with them 5-6 years worth of other band student’s odor-causing bacteria. When you would wear the uniform, it was not a constant odor… rather a cloud that would sporadically rise to the occasion at random times like when we were sitting on the bus waiting to be hauled to a gig, talking on a payphone to call mom to pick you up from said gig, and other peculiar meaningless moments. One second you’d be huffing good old clean natural air, and next thing you know you’d catch a cloud of dusty onions and get the creeps that you were taking in the body odor of someone your same size that had worn the uniform years before you.

Whoa.. I just got another whiff. Pardon me while I close my eyes and imagine I’m back standing next to Miss America 1989’s convertible. There I am.. it’s right before the parade and I’m emptying my sousaphone’s spit valve. I’m talking with fellow sousaphonist Keith Klein and we’re getting ready to crank out some serious quarter note power during Stray Cat Strut.