Okay, I'm serious. I have to say it. I hate "Hips Don't Lie" and I never want to hear it again. Shakira's computer-assisted voice freaks me out, and I can't stand hearing Wyclef Jean say her name that way one more time: "Sha-KI-ra Sha-KI-ra" . I want to knock myself out every time I hear it. And it's not like I'm coming across it on the radio and leaving it on or in any other way listening to it on purpose. It was on everywhere in South Carolina, hereby renamed Shakirolina, for the purposes of this post. My sister left it on several times in the car. It was on the television the other day for some reason - and we all know how little actual music gets played on there anymore. I think it'd be much easier for more people to have successful careers in the entertainment industry if we weren't bludgeoned with the same five people and their lame songs over and over and over again. (Like that "I had a bad day" song. What is with that song? It's okay, I guess, and I know it had something to do with American Idol, but a song worthy of a hundred million plays? Not really. No offense to the guy who sings it, of course - unless he himself is offensive.)

A closer look at "Hips Don't Lie" (because I clearly have nothing better to do) reveals some of the worst lyrics ever, which seems to be a requirement for a top-ten hit. Like, remember that old song, "Johnny Get Angry"? I hope, for your sake, that you don't, and that you also don't know off the top of your head that it was sung by a chick named Joanie Sommer, or Somers, or Sommers. Suzanne's mom, maybe? Don't know. Anyway, it was a 60s tune that had these progressive lyrics:

"Johnny get an-ger-y/Johnny get mad/Give me the biggest lecture I ever had/ I want a brave man/ I want a cave man/Johnny, show me that you care, really care for me...Every girl wants someone who/She can always look up to/You know I love you, of course/Let me know that you're the boss."

Wow. Just thinking about this song makes my ears bleed, but I guess the next time a dude really gives me what for (haha. That is so funny. Just ask my exes. Heehee. Just try going all cave man on me and see how far it gets you. Haha. I am really laughing out loud.) I'll know his love is true. Riggghhhttttt...So I guess things have gotten a little better since then. But "Hips Don't Lie" is still stupid, and it makes me cry for the Fugees:

"I never really knew that she could dance like this/She makes a man want to speak Span-ISH/Como se llama, bonita, mi casa, su casa/Shakira, Shakira"

She makes a man want to speak span-ISH? This is his smoother than smooth entre to the most honest (wink, wink) hips south of the Mississippi? Ay carumba. But Shakira clearly doesn't mind, which means that she hasn't perhaps had a whole lot to work with with other boys, because, "What's your name, beautiful? My house, your house," just sets her spinning:

"Oh baby when you talk like that/You make a woman go mad/So be wise and keep on/Reading the signs of my body."

That was madness-making talk? What? It must have been, as she apparently gets drunk in time for the next verse, because it doesn't make any sense:

"Oh boy, I can see your body moving/Half animal, half man/I don't, don't really know what I'm doing/ But you seem to have a plan/My will and self restraint/Have come to fail now, fail now/See, I am doing what I can, but I can't so you know/That's a bit too hard to explain"

This seems to mean that he reminds her of a merman or a centaur, which really gets her going. She then tries to stop herself from doing something (making a Disney movie about this guy, replete with talking father centaurs, perhaps??), but then she's doing what she can, except for she can't, and she finally comes to terms with the fact that she doesn't have a damned clue and can't explain anything. His expert conclusion is to ask her to dance, thereby giving off some "secret signal" that she actually comes from...where she comes from:

"Senorita, feel the conga, let me see you/move like you come from Colombia".

Lame. 

Wyclef, making me cry for "The Score", rounds out the song by talking about himself, concluding that,

"I ain't guilty, it's a musical transaction/ No more we do snatch ropes/Refugees run the seas 'cause we own our/own boats"

This seems apropos of nothing, not that there's much to be apropos of. I just don't want to hear it anymore. One love, Wyclef. Please do something else. Soon.

In other shocking entertainment news, Justin Timberlake has done drugs. Thankfully, the damage to my belief in real love caused by Carmen Electra and Dave Navarro's shocking breakup has been slightly put to rights by the upcoming Pam Anderson/Kid Rock photo op wedding. Britney wants you to behold the eerily awesome beauty of the tiger. And finally, John Cusack is granted a restraining order against a woman who wasn't me. Rocks and screwdrivers, cherie, are a very bad idea.