On Listening to Music at Work

Story #1
It's not much of a secret. I've got a case of the Bieber Fever. I am fascinated by people who become ridiculously famous in such a short period of time, and Justin Bieber has done just that. His tunes are also quite catchy. About a year and a half ago I began hearing a bit here and there about the Biebs and I investigated out of curiosity. This was righttttt when his first single started coming on the radio. Back then I said to my fiance, Nick "I bet that kid is going to be huge." A year and a half later he is just a tad more than huge.

My friends know that I have the Bieber Fever and that I like listening to his music. I even follow him on Twitter which even more people find entertaining. Nick has always laughed it off, but the other night I wanted to see the Biebs' cameo on Saturday Night Live. While I waited for his cameo Nick... for the first time ever... denounced my interest in Bieber. He said "Ok, now I think you're being borderline creepy. You follow him on twitter and know everything about him. If I knew all of this stuff about Miley Cyrus you would think it's creepy." Point taken.

This was the first time that Nick seemed annoyed by my following of the Biebs. I changed the channel to Jersey Shore instead and we called it a night.

Nick and I use Grooveshark to listen to music at work. You can pretty much listen to any song you want and create your own playlists. Nick is always trying to get me to follow his playlists and interact on the site, but I would just much rather use it for listening purposes only. I really do not like people seeing what music I listen to. I could NEVER put my ipod on a speaker system at a party ever. Too much risky uncool songs in my ipod. Because Nick follows me on Grooveshark (which I would rather he didn't) he can see every song that I listen to every day which kind of freaks me out in a big brother kind of way. He doesn't check every day, but today he did apparently. So this was our conversation at dinner tonight:

Nick: I saw on your Grooveshark today that you listened to "Baby" by Justin Bieber 16 times and then "Eenie Meenie" by him 9 times today. That is sick.

Me: (Caught! defense, defense, defense mode!) I had a bunch of people in my office today and kept having to restart. I get distracted. I wasn't listening the whole time. I had my headphones off on the desk and they were the only two songs in my playlist at the moment and I had the playlist on repeat (wow I came up with that so quickly!) And ummm why are you being creepy and stalking what I am listening to.

Nick: I was checking to see if you have been listening to anything good so I can get some ideas for my playlist. I think you listening to Justin Bieber on repeat is way more creepy than me tracking your songs.

Me: I really don't like that you watch what I listen to on Grooveshark. I am unfriending you tomorrow.

Nick: Fine, unfriend me. The point of being friends with someone on Grooveshark is to get music ideas from each other, but I am obviously not getting any ideas from you.

Me: Fine.

Busted.

Story #2:
Nick is always trying to get me to be more interactive on Grooveshark. He always says "It's web 2.0 and you need to interact with other users to get the full benefits from the site blah blah." (Nick is a computer engineer.) He always sends me songs and makes me look at playlists that he has made. Sorry, but I am uninterested. I just want to listen to my embarrassing music if I want to and not be worried about being stalked by my fiance.

Ever since I was young, I really have not liked people what I am listening to. But now that I am older, I ESPECIALLY don't like people to see what I listen to while I am at work. Work makes me go insane on a daily basis and music is one of the only things that keeps my sanity (music and g-chatting with my mom!) Sometimes while I am at work I get into really weird moods (ehem, Yo-Yo Ma, showtunes, and sometimes Bieber on repeat).

The other day I was reading an article about Julie Andrews and my train of thought went Julie Andrews -> I love Sound of Music -> I also love Mary Poppins -> The music from that movie was awesome-> look up soundtrack on Grooveshark! Naturally.

Apparently I got kinda into one of the songs because I was nodding my head to the tune of Feed the Birds from the Mary Poppins soundtrack... so random. My office mate walked into the office and said "What are you listening to?" I have shared an office with her for 2.5 years and she has never asked me that. I was so taken by surprise and could not think of any song or artist in the world. ANY. Total mental blank and just I could not say "the soundtrack to Mary Poppins!" I was nodding my head like I was listening to Katy Perry for goodness sake! The best I could come up with was "I am listening to a pop song playlist." She accepted the answer and sat at her desk. I stared at the computer screen and seriously assessed my music taste.

Later that night, me and Nick went to a sushi bar. While we were there I was going to tell him about how my office mate asked me what I was listening to. To begin my story I said to him "So I have been listening to a lot of Mary Poppins lately and..." He almost choked on his edamame. He erupted into such a laughter that I immediately regretted starting the story. He said "Wow, this may be worse than your obsession with Justin Bieber."

Highlight the text after the star to reveal which story is true * The true story is story number 2. Although I do have the Bieber Fever, it was MARY POPPINS that got me caught red handed. It must have been a rough day at work cause I needed some childhood music to make me happy.