You’re Not Invited to My Party

Remember that time on the playground when you were little, when your best friend pushed you too hard on the swings and you fell tragically to the ground, skinning your knee and bruising your rock-solid ego? And remember what you said once you finished screaming all those obscenities?\n“You’re not invited to my party.”\nThat’s right, well I’m bringing it back. Full-on. \nI’m currently in the works with Mark Zuckerberg to establish yet another amazing new Facebook application. That is, if the already-established “Compare Hotness” or “Are You Going to Heaven or Hell?” applications just aren’t cutting it for you anymore. Now you will be able to invite friends to your party while simultaneously not inviting others – an uninvitation complete with the heartfelt “You’re Not Invited to Teri’s Party” notification.\nHere’s my one rule – if you follow it, you’re in: In the “favorite music” section on your profile, does it say you’ll “listen to anything? Or, even worse, “... anything but country?”\nIf so, go check your inbox. You have officially been uninvited. How am I supposed to have a gay old time with just “anything” blasting through the speakers? \nMusic has the power to affect your every mood, and “anything” isn’t actually a musical genre or a mood. It’s just lazy. \n“What music do you think Johnny wants to hear at the party?”\n“Oh, you know. It could be that CD of various siren noises he has, or maybe the soothing sounds of Asian water buffaloes mating. You know Johnny, he’ll listen to anything.” \nThe truth is that it is not true – that’s never true. Sure, you may not be picky, and you may even be quite open-minded (which explains that extensive Weird Al Yankovic collection), but I guarantee you will not gleefully “listen to anything.” \nAnd why would you want to? Music is a pretty integral part of our lives, especially as college students. We listen to it while we study, on our walk to class, at Sports on Friday night, when we’re in our cars, while we’re seducing new friends – hell, even while we’re seducing old friends. It is undeniably everywhere and, for the most part, we each have control over what exactly it is we are listening to. So why the lack of preferences? \nI blame Dave Matthews Band.\nJust kidding. (A little bit.) Seriously though, not only does it tell me that you have no interest in expanding and developing your musical tastes and subsequently expanding your mind to become a more enlightened person on the whole, but it really is a turn-off.\nNot that my straight male readership is trying to turn me on specifically, but I’d like to hope there are other girls out there who feel what I’m saying, and vice versa for the boys. To be honest, I couldn’t care less what your musical preferences are (barring the aforementioned Dave Matthews Band), I just care that you have preferences. All people deserve to have their own magical play list, their own personally selected tunes to chill them out, wind them up or just make them happy.\nBut, alas, if you refuse to accept this, it’ll be – as Pink so gracefully put it – “just you and your hand tonight” because you certainly won’t be getting any at my party.