I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: TXT (투모로우바이투게더) ‘Cat & Dog’ (2019).

Because this book is about cats and dogs, I was going to put “Cats & Dogs” from The Head and The Heart as this song.  Bit when I searched for “Cats & Dogs” the first video was for this song.  And any band whose name is in a language I can’t read will certainly get posted here.

In fact, I didn’t even realize they were called “TXT” I thought it was something to do with text messaging.

Turns out TXT stands for Tomorrow X Together.  Of course.

The video starts with five cute boys running to the a window and looking out on a cartoon world.  It seemed like The Monkees.

So I was quite surprised when the song started with heavy bass and auto-tuned and I realized that duh, this must be a K-pop band.

I assumed I’d heard of all of the popular K-Pop bands by now (how many could there be?), but here’s one I’d not heard of.  Nevertheless. this song has over 47 million views.

I really don’t know how to talk about K-Pop.

The five of them are adorable and pretty much identical (hair color being the distinguishing factor).  They all seem to dance well (in the heavily edited sequences).  All of their voices are auto-tuned so who knows if they can sing.  They are also singing in at least two languages, so who knows what they are singing.

I assume the language I can’t understand is Korean, although it sounded to me like Spanish at one point (which seems very unlikely).

There’s a repeated refrain of someone gong “brrrp brrrp brrrp” which is a weird but catchy hook for all languages.  I assume that none of the boys’ voices can possibly go deep enough t make that sound.

Apparently, this song has something to do with cats and dogs because there are meows and barks in the song (and in the video they do lots of synchronized cat and dog ear movements).

I’m kind of curious what the chorus actually says–are they saying the word “Pet” or is a Korean word?

At the end he sings I just wanna be your dog, but not in any way like Iggy Pop.

Sometimes it’s fun to dive into music you don’t ever experience.

[READ: February 6, 2020] Kitten Construction Company: A Bridge Too Fur

I really enjoyed the first Kitten Construction Company book.  I loved the premise–not that the kittens were good at building things–but that no one took them seriously because they were so cute.  It allowed for a lot of funny frustrations from our feline friends.

Well, now the city of Mewberg has fully accepted the Kitten Construction Company. They have built a new stadium with updated energy efficiencies and plumbing.

There’s a nice joke that while accepting the adulation for this stadium, architect Marmalade can’t help but knock the microphone stand off the podium.  I only wish that Green had drawn it to look more deliberate–that would have been a lot funnier.  Instead it almost seems like an accident.

But even kittens can’t rest.  Not when there is a new bridge to be build.  The old one is falling apart and Marmalade is on task to design a new one.  Marmalade’s design is wonderful. But it’s not until Professor von Wigglebottom points out that a bridge goes over water that Marmalade and all the other cats gasp.

It’s up to Bubbles, the plumber, who is not afraid of water, to be in charge.

But the cats can’t handle being so close to water and the construction falls apart–thta has to put them way over budget, no?

So Samson runs out to get workers who can help.

And Samson returns with unconventional help–five dogs!   They are Longboi, Maws, Reg the Edge, Nugget and the foreman, Carl Barks (ha).

Marmalade is freaked out that the are dogs.  Marmalade instantly get worried about the quality of the work.  Even when Bubbles says they ware working hard, Marmalade tries to catch them failing.

Then Marmalade catches the dogs looking over the plans. Carl says he’s not changing the plans, he’s improving them.    This angers Marmalade: “You dogs think you’re better than us kittens?”  But one of the other kittens looks at the changes and says they make a lot of sense.

The best part comes midway through the book when (like in the last book) there are actual photos of actual dogs on a construction site.

Once the kitten point out that Marmalade is being crazy, the kitten has a change of heart and apologizes to Carl.  Carl is very cool about it saying ‘You are more than just cute and adorable and I am more than just slobber factor that chases cars.”

This calls for a boop.  Boop!

And so all creatures work together despite their differences in appearance and background.  Nice!

It’s a cute book with a good message although its not quite as funny as the first one was.