Slanguage TV

For everyone out there who has long harbored a desire to test his or her ability to decipher hippie slang as read by a German teenager, you're welcome.

Coming Up for Air

(Cue Thus Spake Zarathustra from 2001)

We, and by we, I mean I have emerged from a nearly two-year slumber not unlike the mighty cicadas which are now swarming over the disgusted citizenry of suburban Chicago. Of course, we (I) only slept for two years, while they hibernate for seventeen, but I am told they do that for reasons that relate to prime numbers, and two is a prime number as well, so quit being so quick to judge.

Many of our loyal readership is likely wondering what happened? Where have they been? What new trend-words or "twerds" have we been missing out on without the staff of Slanguage to hold our hand daintily like a southern gentlemen guiding us past somebody's darling and assuring us that the terrible conflagration would soon be at an end?

Cast your minds back, back as far as September 20th, 2005, a Tuesday, my fourth favourite day of the week (for obvious reasons). Fred and I were packing our belongings into an old ruck-sack in preparation for our upcoming trip to the Annual Conference on Post-Modern Fiction sponsored by the editorial board of Teen People and held in Uppsala, Sweden. As we bickered playfully over how David Foster Wallace would react if Fred wore his favorite Old Navy blazer to the Auster Cotillion, neither of us knew what adventure, or tragedy, lay ahead... By tragedy, I am referring to how Fred died. I'm not sure if that was clear.

To be continued...

Taking Over

We won't speak about what happened to Fred. We will not discuss the multiple burns he must have sustained, or the inevitable damage to his liver. We will not hypothesize about the severed ring finger that was mailed to us. We will certainly not discuss the bloody class ring that came with it. We will avoid, at all costs, mention of the forceps, the rusted scythe, the mason jar, the ballpoint pen, the "aggie," the protractor, the glue stick, the Lou Rawls commemorative plate, or the number 2 pencil. It's simply not appropriate for this forum.

What is appropriate is my current obsession: DJ Khaled's "We Takin' Over."


There are many angles to approach this song from: you could examine how DJ Khaled, a man completely devoid of talent (other than grimacing into a fisheye lens) has convinced the best rappers of the moment to appear on a track and in a video with him. You could look into Fat Joe's insistence that every one of his verses be references to other, more famous rap verses. Or you could take the easy route and make fun of Rick Ross. However, I'm going to devote this post to simply trying to figure out what the fuck the increasingly untouchable Lil Wayne is actually saying.

Half the verse is plain jane: "I have more jewels than your jeweler," "I stay on track like a box of Pumas," etc. The other half is completely confusing (especially the syncopated line immediately preceding the beat coming back in, it sounds vaguely like "I like my spine, east to please.") Now, you think it'd be easy to look that up on the internet. Not so. Because it's technically illegal to publish lyrics without obtaining permission, the websites that ultimately DO publish lyrics are pretty lame and are more likely to fire a shotgun blast of pop-up ads in your face than give you accurate Lil Wayne information. As such, various sites had various interpretations on that one crucial line. Here are a few:

A. "And I like, my spite ease the peak"

B. "And I like my Sprite easter pink"

C. "And, I'm like my spirit easter pink"

As it turns out, B is almost definitely the correct answer. The ever reliable urbandictionary.com defines "Easter Pink Sprite" as "Blood and cocaine mixed." I also saw it elsewhere as referring to Codeine, or Codeine and Sprite mixed. Delish, all around.

Still, the various interpretations made for some enjoyable reading. Given the absence of a definitive source (most rap lyrics are not reprinted in the liner notes), these ungoverned, slapdash lyric databases are the only source of information vis a vis Lil Wayne's vernacular hijinks. As such, I'll be revisiting them in the days ahead, noting discrepancies, poking fun, and bringing you the best recipes for Easter Pink Sprite.

p.s. I'm not the only one who was curious about that line. For an enjoyable discussion on the subject, peep: http://forums.sohh.com/showthread.php?t=856521