Mailbag!!!!

Welcome to the mailbag. This is a mailed in version of an article that is used in lieu of actually writing something meaningful. It is also offers an opportunity for those of you that can’t speak your thoughts during the week. To make your opinion known, email badmothercoitus@yahoo.com with your question and your name and city and state you’re from. Here are real letters from real people, that really read this.

Who is your favorite news anchor of all time?

Steve Adams
Duluth, Minnesota

This is an excellent question, Stephen, and one that was debated for long hours over many pots of coffee. The coffee turned into beer and the beer into whiskey, and with the rising sun a little boy brought us all bloody marys and the process began all over again. Three weeks later and a bar tab that we're hoping that we can use as a corporate expense and as a tax write off, we reached the conclusion that Dan Rather is the official News Anchor for Bad Mother Coitus. His country bumpkinism's coupled with the fact that most of us wish that he was really our Father and that cool Texas stare have lead us to believe that this is the only logical conclusion. As of right now, nobody from Rather's camp has returned our phone call, so that we can set up an official award time; however, we are very optimistic about it and booking some time on the local cable access show to present him with the award.

Would you please provide a close reading or an interpretation of Gwen Stefani's 'Holla Back Girl'

Carrie Dye
Barrow, Alaska

Certainly! Truly this is poetry at it's finest!

Uh huh,this my shit
All the girls stomp your feet like this

This is an obvious homage to Homer and the Iliad. Ms. Stefani begins with the invocation of the muse and the beginning of the Epic. Whereas Homer uses, O Muse! Let me sing of the rage of Achilles, Ms. Stefani uses a much more subtle, much more textual tone when invoking her muse.A few times I've been around that track So it's not just gonna happen like that 'Cause I ain't no holla back girl I ain't no holla back girl The thesis statement, the protaganist's bold assertion that she will not go softly into the night, that she is indeed, not a holla back girl! The passion in this statement can definitely be felt as she emphatically repeats this fact again, and again and again.

ooh, this my shit , this my shit

Not being a holla back girl, appears to be something that is very important to the protaganist. While to a lesser reader, this could be misinterpreted as perhaps the protaganist had a solid night of drinking capped off by a late night trip to Taco Bell. And who hasn't had that happen to them before? Coming back from the bar, knowing that the next day is going to hurt and that some food should, at the very least, be dumped into the stomach. And who is always there at 2:30 in the morning; why your friendly, local, neighborhood Taco Bell. Taco Bell offers a wide variety of food for the wayward drunk, especially amusing is ordering the entire menu, carrying it on a tray and then combining it into a Taco Bell Ball. The Taco Bell Ball is awesome because it's both suitable for consumption as well as hurling at compatriot drunks.

I heard that you were talking shit
And you didn't think that I would hear it
People hear you talking like that, getting everybody fired up
So I'm ready to attack, gonna lead the pack
Gonna get a touchdown, gonna take you out
That's right, put your pom-poms down, getting everybody fired up

I will address this in two parts. Yet again Ms. Stefani, dips into her alliteration hand bag, this time quoting the Bible, Psalm 71, reworking the phrase for my enemies speak against me, and those that have sought my hurt will be put to shame and disgraced. In both cases, we have our protagonist stating that they heard something that they weren't supposed to hear, a secret if you will. This has obviously worked everyone around into a tizzy. A tizzy that must be met with arms.

So that's right dude, meet me at the bleachers
No principals, no student-teachers
Both of us wanna be the winner, but there can only be one
So I'm gonna fight, gonna give it my all
Gonna make you fall, gonna sock it to you
That's right, I'm the last one standing, another one bites the dust

The protagonist, now offers a meeting location though no meeting time. Offering this up to the antagonist as the formal challenge, the duel if you will, but an open ended duel. This both follows the code of the epic poem and gentlemen limitations and rules. It is an enticing morsel and a true look into the vast crevasse of genius that Ms. Stefani possesses as she has her protagonist come to the epiphany that while both her antagonist and her protagonist wish to win, there can, like the Highlander, be only one. This is quite the bit to digest and a real philosophical question. One that I've poured through philosophical journals, from Hume to Jung to fully grasp and yet no one has done it so completely or been able to explain it as perfectly as Ms. Stefani does in the conclusionary line of this paragraph: Another one bites the dust.

Let me hear you say this shit is bananas, b-a-n-a-n-a-s

The immediate grab of the conclusionary line is the use of rhythm and the bucking of the system of poetry as Ms. Stefani rids herself of the shackles of the conclusionary couplet, shedding herself of rigid means that have been given to us by the rest of the poetic world for an ending. Not unlike the legendary Maud Gonne shedding her old robes to reveal the beauty that was the new Ireland, Ms. Stefani finishes her epic by burying it; leaving this work for generations yet to come. All in all, it's all bananas, this conflict with the antagonist, the epic battle for protagonist it really means nothing on this great stage the world has given us. But one day, this, day she called the world her brother and drew arms with us and let us into the fray as a mere mortal and emerge. Emerge from a baptism by fire, with a flaming sword, grit and chock full of resolve.