Who Likes Fall Out Boy?

Mads, my Norwegian companion, was still on his McDonald's franchise kick, so we went to the one at Faneuil Hall with Matty, my personal biographer, who was in town with his adopted son, Goodtimes, so Mads could do a little research.

After we got our food, we sat in a booth. I was nodding my head to the song playing above us.

"This song is pretty hot: thanks for the memories, thanks for the memories..."

Mads and Matty looked at each other.

"You're serious?"

"Why?"

"This is Fall Out Boy," Mads said.

"So."

"So, they suck."

"Whatever."

"Hey, do they do that everything is all right song?" Matty said.

"I think that's Motion City Soundtrack."

"Same difference."

"Whatever."

"I'm just sayin'. Man, I remember hearing that song at a strip club."

"Everything is all right?"

"Yeah."

"What is that song called, anyway?"

"I think it's 'Everything is All Right'."

"Oh, that's easy."

"Remember when they used that song on Laguna Beach?"

"No."

"Jason and his friends were playing golf. It was when he was dating Alex, but hooking up with Jessica again."

"Oh, right before Cabo?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah, I remember that."

"Hey, how did we start talking about this?"

Do You Live and Love?

For whatever reason, I never got a chance to catch this season's Laguna Beach. I was in luck, though, when MTV had a marathon of season three on Friday, and I TiVoed the whole fucking thing.

Laguna Beach is an amazing show, where these teenage kids generally communicate without actually saying anything, and live with an over-inflated sense of self-importance, like most teenagers, and we get to watch how silly they are. Season three was a slight disappointment in comparison to season two, with only a few exceptions. It did have my homegirl Jessica, which was absolutely fantastic, and she was hilarious in trying to win over some high school junior she had the hots for, a guy named Cameron that made out with a few other girls while Jessica pursued him.

Probably the best scene, a scene better than anything in the first two seasons, was a date between a girl named Rocky and her boyfriend Alex. She really wanted an adult like commitment from Alex, and for some reason, maybe because she was only 16, completely missed the fact that poor Alex was blessed with the personality of a raisin. So anyway, they're on the date, and Rocky wants to gauge Alex's feelings, and she gets nothing. An awkward silence ensues, until Alex takes Rocky by the hand, and examines her bracelet, which says "Live and Love" on it.

"Live and Love"? He said.

"Yep."

"... Do you... live... and love?" (I'm serious, he said it!)

"...I love you..."

Big pause.

"...yeah...I... love you too... I think..."

That was my holiday weekend party favor. Everyone that stopped by got to see that. Of course, Alex dumped Rocky right after that, for whatever teenage boy reason, then came clamoring back when he couldn't find a better chick. And equally as predictable, Rocky took him back, because she needed a prom date, and apparently she mistook Alex's telling her what he thought she wanted to hear for his being really sweet to her some times. God, I loved it.

It's nice to know that teenagers are the same now as they were twenty years ago when I was in high school.