Author Archives: Jackson Watson

Hockey pregame song

Tim Marino is a 20 year old engineering student at USC. He was born in Calgary, Alberta and had lived there his entire life. Tim grew up a victim of Canadian stereotypes, playing hockey and eating maple syrup. Because he played hockey, I asked Tim if him or his team had any rituals they would do before games. Tim said before every game they would sing the same song, and it goes as follows:

“There was a dirty bird (repeat), that had a dirty bill (repeat), that sat upon (repeat), my window sill (repeat), so I lured him in (repeat), with a piece of bread (repeat), SO I COULD SMASH (repeat), HIS FUCKING HEAD (repeat)”

Tim said they would sing this repeat after me song before every game as it would get him excited and get his blood boiling. Because it was an aggressive song, and because his entire team would get very into it, he said it would help them have more energy when they entered the game. I personally think the lyrics don’t matter as much as the team environment, with everyone chanting one thing in unison and yelling it as loud as they can. I just wonder why they chose these lyrics to sing.

Hoser term

Tim Marino is a 20 year old engineering student at USC. He was born in Calgary, Alberta and had lived there his entire life. Tim grew up a victim of Canadian stereotypes, playing hockey and eating maple syrup. He said many of the terms he used and heard, had to do with these two things. For example:

“Back in Canada, there is a term, hoser, used as kind of an insult, and it dates back to the pre-zamboni era, when the losing hockey team would actually have to hose down the ice after the game, and yeah you could definitely say there is a derogatory connotation with the word.”

Tim said he heard this term many times throughout schooling, and said it was used as a derogatory term when he was younger, but then became more of a sarcastic insult that people didn’t necessarily take offense to as he got older. I have never heard this term, and I think it definitely applies based on the area and hobbies that they perform. Because they are such a hockey heavy region, this term became so prominent.

Snake in a box prank

Graham is a 21 year old music major at USC. He is originally from Houston Texas and has lived there his whole live, he specifically lived on a ranch. A big part of Graham’s family activities is hunting. His grandfather and father take him quail, duck and hog hunting frequently. Graham says his life involved a lot of hunting before he came to LA. He also mentioned that his are and family was big into pranking. He tells the story of a prank he witnessed at a post hunt barbeque.

“My grandfather each year took the same oil and gas people on a hunting trip to go quail hunting in south Texas, same lease same people same company, so each year each man was required to bring certain things to a barbeque after, one person brought biscuits, another eggs, some would bring sausage, other burgers for food. And my grandfather was in charge of desserts, my grandfather each brought the same chocolate cake, incredibly good, one of the best in Texas, a recipe he learned from his aunt Etna, so everyone would be drinking around the fire and would go back and get this cake and bum rush it, I mean there was no patience for this stuff it was like sweet nectar to these people, anyway, my grandfather saw this and pulled a prank one year and put a live rattlesnake inside the cake box, so when you open up the cake, the snake was there, so my grandfather said ‘hey guys I think it’s time for dessert’ and everyone rushed to get cake and my grandfather’s friend also named john got there first, opened it up, and a live rattlesnake was coiled up, so year after year people are always careful when they go open the cake box now.”

Graham mentioned that people in Texas have grown accustomed to rattlesnakes, but they are something people respect and fear, and know not to get too close too. Graham said this prank was used for laughs and to teach a lesson in carefulness and patience that he said is performed quite often when people get too comfortable with something. I again think this is an interesting prank, as rattlesnakes don’t exist in many places.

Turkey on a Chain Prank

Graham is a 21 year old music major at USC. He is originally from Houston Texas and has lived there his whole live, he specifically lived on a ranch. A big part of Graham’s family activities is hunting. His grandfather and father take him quail, duck and hog hunting frequently. Graham says his life involved a lot of hunting before he came to LA. He said that there was a prank that someone pulled on his grandfather, and has been done many times in his area. Graham speaks of his grandfather then passing this prank on and doing it to a friend of his. Graham says now that he has heard of the prank, he cant wait until he does it to one of his friends one day.

“my grandfather had a friend that had never been turkey hunting before, and so, my grandfather, john dumpki said ‘I’m gonna take you on a hunt Walt’ and so they went to the ranch and Walt was extremely excited to go Turkey Hunting, more so than any other person my grandfather had ever taken hunting, needless to say, Walt did not know my grandfather and his partner had purchased a prize turkey AKA the biggest best and strongest looking turkey in Texas. They shipped the turkey to the ranch without Walt’s knowing, and set him up for the best trap. So Walt gets up, wakes up at 430 in the morning before sunrise, and my grandfather said to Walt ‘I have the perfect baiting line where there are always turkey and you’re gonna sit there until they come there and you’re gonna shoot one’, and so there was a pop up blind that Walt sat waiting behind for the turkey and my grandfather is on top of hill with binoculars looking down at Walt, and needless to say turkeys slowly come out of trees coming towards the feeder, my grandfather is sitting on top of hill, looking at Walt stick his barrel right outside window of the blind, all of sudden the big turkey walks out of the bushes and my grandfather sees Walt’s barrel shaking cause he’s so nervous, heart racing, and he knows he’s about to take the big turkey, so Walt shoots, hits the turkey, jumps out of blind, so excited he sprints over, and turkey is dead, picks up turkey by feet and drags it to truck, then he hears a yank, the turkey isn’t going any farther, then he looked down and noticed turkey was tethered by a chain to a tree, then he noticed it was all set up , looks at grandfather with binoculars laughing cause he had waited all his life to take that guy hunting”

I think this prank is something very Southern related. Where I am from, there is no such thing as hunting. I think it is interesting to see how prominent a part of life it was for Graham and the way that his family and other families in the region made fun through hunting.

Story of the Stars

Matt is an 18 year old Freshman at USC who grew up in northern California. His parents are from Greece and were born there and then moved to the United States. He said when he was younger one of his favorite things to do was look at the stars and find constellations. One day his parents told him a story as follows:

“So like, lemme think, essentially, there is like no humans, and uh, all of the animals used to live in harmony, and then they were being mean to each other, and mother nature was like, “screw you guys I’m gonna put a blanket over the world”, and mother nature put a blanket over the worlds and all the animals were like “what the frick man I want to hang out with the sun,” and the animals kept trying to get the blanket off, and mother nature wouldn’t take it off, frogs tried to jump to pull it off, no luck, giraffes reached their necks as high as they could but still couldn’t reach it, birds tried to fly up there and they poked holes in it and that didn’t do anything except create little holes of light, and then the animals just decided to just get along, and then mother nature said “ok I’ll take the blanket off for half of each day,” and the holes that the birds made are the stars.”

Matt said he vaguely remembered the story, because it was one of his favorites as a kid growing up because of his obsession with stars. Matt said this story stuck with him and he even bought a telescope afterwards to see if he could see the little holes that the birds made. I had never heard this story before, and I think it is unique. Matt said his parents learned it in Greece when they were children, but I personally do not see any Greek elements of it. Matt also isn’t the best storyteller in my opinion.