On the twelfth day of Christmas, my Giphy gave to me. . .
Twelve drummers drumming
Eleven pipers piping
Ten lords a-leaping
Nine ladies dancing
Eight maids a-milking
Seven swans a-swimming
Six geese a-laying
FIVE GOLDEN RINGS
Four calling birds
Three French hens
Two turtle doves
And a hm hm-mm in a hm hmm.
EXPLANATION. You know that I explain myself far too often. Or I just think of something else and tack it on, in non-linear fashion. I started off by testing out my "new" (to me) Giphy program. It's really quite good and dead-easy to use, fast, and lets you use tenths of a second. They're also clearer and much larger, so you can post them original size. Big drawback, they're only half the length, but isn't it better to have a system that actually WORKS?
In testing it out, I must have been in a Freudian free-associating festive mood or something, as I wanted to see what a real turtle dove looked like. Then TWO turtle doves, and then, oh God. I was giffing them all over the place. And one thing led to another.
In most cases I have free-associated, and in nearly all cases I've been free with the numbers. I hate math anyway and am no good at it, still count by shooting my fingers and get lost after seven. My IQ is 143, which is not too shabby, though I guess it could be higher. It's just curious I can't count, is all.
So twelve drummers drumming get collapsed down into one. That's close enough, isn't it? I was going to try to get an image of Ringo at his drum kit, but then thought: Jesus, that's dumb and unimaginitive. So I ended up with one raw turkey drumstick, which is pretty festive when you think about it, especially when being rinsed under the tap.
Eleven pipers piping was at first going to be someone filling a hash pipe or a bong or something, but there were THOUSANDS of pot videos to choose from, all of them made by people who were extremely stoned. So it ended up being a piping bag, which is every bit as nice, don't you think?
Ten lords a-leaping. I cannot explain this one, except that "lords a-leaping" reminded me of Stephen Fry. I don't know if he leaps or not, but here he's getting jiggy while sitting in a chair. I love the psychedelic lighting, a nice touch.
Nine ladies dancing. The tango scene from the movie Frida seemed like a natural. Pretend there are nine of them if you're a stickler. I especially love Alfred Molina as Diego Rivera. He's perfect, and believable. Without him the whole movie would collapse under its own pretentions.
Eight, seven, six, five. . .
Four calling birds might be a bit confusing. Forget the four, for one thing. Forget the calling. This is a BIRD, as in British bird, as in Twiggy. I was sick of birds anyway. In this whole song there are twenty-three birds, which is like twenty-two too many.
And the rest takes care of itself.
