south by northwest

"but if their hearts were dying that fast, they'd have done the same as you ... might have done the same as you"



No less than four times a week do I employ the "run out the clock" strategy. That does not include Monday or Tuesday.

I use the phrase "run out the clock scenario" more often.

You've played ugly all game and you're struggling at 3-5 Illinois. You lead 14-9 with 2:32 left in the fourth quarter. The Illini have one time out left and you're at your own 23-yard line. It's first and ten. It's strictly a "Run. Out. The clock. Scenario." Take your knees and get the hell out of there. 74 East never looked better.

You'll hear boos and you may drop from No. 6 to No. 8 but it's mid-October. There is plenty of time to rebound.

It's a marathon not a sprint unless you're involved in a 100-meter dash.

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A "K" may be worth five points in Scrabble but I can't credit Death Cab for Cutie with a five or anything higher than a three for Narrow Stairs. They struck out with the effort.

What do you call the hottest girl in Cleveland? "Queen of the Fives."

One of the better songs on their weakest album is "Long Division." Midway not the airport through the song Ben Gibbard describes in passing the relationship of the couple in the song. He explains that they "carry on like long division," another in a storied career of stunning lyrics from the 35-year-old from northwest Washington state. I carry on like long division in my "Tuesday morning before work" routine. I meander from a bed I didn't make the night before to the shower that's low on hot water before a joyless session of brushing my teeth and not combing my hair.

The rest of the album save three or four songs feels like a "run out the clock scenario."

The slogan at Harry's Chocolate Shop on the campus of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind. is "Go Ugly Early." Death Cab heeded those words and went grizzly early inserting "Cath" as the album's fourth song. They stopped in after work for a few drinks and took home a girl from Cleveland at 6:17 p.m.

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Cath carries on like long division all the way to a marriage she does not want. The song includes examples of brilliant songwriting too many to recount. But for one line, the song would rank amongst my favorites. An anthem for those men who have both learned and accepted losing, "Cath" is my least favorite #DCFC song.

"No," I thought. "Oh no." My ears saw it coming upon first listen. I hadn't even used a Q-tip on that Tuesday morning.

"Don't do it, Ben. Don't do it."

Then it happened.

" .... But you said your vows and you closed the door on so many men, who would have loved you more."



Death Cab set the bar high in their previous decade so this cheapo lyric has always bothered me. It seems so forced. So pathetic. It's like having round-trip tickets anywhere in the world and flying to Roanoke, Va. Much like condoms pre-1990s television shows, they didn't even have to use it. It's just so un-DeathCabby.

The video for "Cath" also fucking sucks and is creepy.

While we can't say the same about Cath, "Cath" redeems itself with its closing lyric. To me, the song deals with the way so many women rush into marriage because they feel there is a clock ticking to quad zeros and they are running out of time. They're not. Their hearts "aren't dying fast." They have plenty of time to support a beating heart and pick up two or three bad habits like cocaine or something that actually would stop their beating hearts.

The songwriter, in this case a total pu--------pansy, makes a good point in the closing seconds and it stings. The audience at the wedding - they who employ the whispers that it won't last - likely would get married too ... to a man (or woman) they didn't love if their hearts were dying fast. No one's heart is dying that fast. Yet even in that case, the case of the dying heart, they "might" only get married to a guy with that haircut.

Luckily, Death Cab did not simply run out the clock in the final moments of this song even if Cath is destined to for the rest of her pre-divorced life.

Welcome to the eternal Tuesday morning, C. That will kill your heart.