Castaway

Yesterday I had lunch with a childhood friend. We go way, way, way back. Third grade, I think. It marked the first time we sat down together and shared a meal in something like twenty years. (Lunch was great. As a couple of dim sum neophytes, we did OK at Ming's in Palo Alto. No perceived social or gastronomic missteps.) We covered the full gamut of topics that you'd expect: career, family, current passions, his untimely and stunning death, and selected remembrances of our misguided youth. I had a great time. And he inspired me in a lot of ways.

Prior to our rendezvous, I had sent my buddy an .mp3 file of a song that we listened to back in the day. The song is "Miles Out to Sea" by the U.K. glam-rock band Slade. (Yeh. I know you've never heard of the song -- nor the band, for that matter. But if you have, give yourself a few bonus points. This band is more important in the annals of rock than you might expect.) Anyway... There's a line in that song that puzzled us back then. And it still baffles us now.

Here's the specific verse:

From the outside looking in
Was a stranger with a grin
Seeing bombhead on a rope
He was swinging high and low
High and low

So... What's a bombhead? Methinks I gotta know.

But maybe not.

You might be asking: What's with the "Castaway" title for this post? My buddy and I were in a band called Castaway. He sang; I played guitar. And the band name was taken from a Greg Kihn (remember him?) song.