In the interest of documenting our culture's last bastion of folk tradition, I must report that I heard a new variation of "Jingle Bells, Batman Smells" today in which the line I remember from childhood, "And Joker got away" was replaced with "And Joker played ballet."

Sure, it's a silly children's rhyme, but one must remember that it is part of a living oral tradition, much like other folk music was back before people had the means to record it. Even today, when people are doing their best to capture every obscure little snatch of song ever uttered, I fear that children's rhymes go largely unnoticed by music scholars. It is this fact, and this fact alone that allows these rhymes to be part of an evolving oral tradition. They're not set in the stone of an official recording. They're free and wild, passed down through the generations by bored elementary school children. Whoopeee!

I did my mad scientist routine today at the party where I heard this. I got tipped well, both in money and in cake. Chocolate, cash, and the opportunity to witness an evolving oral tradition. A good way to spend the afternoon if I do say so myself.

I wonder if anybody who wasn't a sociology major ever thinks about stuff like this