and so changed were our lives

scene: two earthy, unassuming twenty-somethings drink hoppy mountain beers and play a drinking game in their grassy somerville side-yard on a warm june's eve. she is a giggling kind, with an affinity for gourmet cooking and records on vinyl. he is a mild mannered fellow who builds and rides bicycles, and maintains a flourishing roof-top garden. it is dark, but the warm glow of a bedroom light illuminates their rustic wooden playing table just enough for them to finger their way through the dirt and retrieve bottle caps to toss, haphazardly intoxicated, toward partially filled ceramic mugs. they listen to music, namely of the hippie variety, which emanates from an ipod set atop the window's ledge. there are twangs of the banjo, the mandolin, heady voices, songs about skies and moons and rivers and things.

and then, all at once, it happens. ipod shuffle. a song, downloaded from a file-sharing application and labeled as by the artist "belle & sebastian" begins. only not. legs twitch, hips thrust, prudence is abandoned. a shut up triggers their inner but latent passion for mid-nineties german dance club pop. and so it goes...