Lyric discussion by anonymiad 

"now back home in new york lately i've had a couple of friends tell me i talk too much... well, when pressed, they admitted i talked too much about myself. so, what i'd like to do is tell you a story about someone else... so 300 years after christ lived, in a place called micronesia, lived a woman who's now known as saint barbara. back then she was just named barbara. now saint barbara was the daughter of an aristocrat, and there was a weird thing that happened back then, which is a lot different from what happens now, which was that rich people actually fought wars. so he was away fighting a war, and his daughter saint barbara decided to become a christian. and - being a christian was not 300 years after christ what being a christian is now. like, bible study and safe and youth groups and shit. (audience: it was awesome!) i don't know if it was awesome, because i think it was kinda at moments, not so awesome, i think you're gonna find that out. and so, i think - the one thing i keep saying is maybe back then it was maybe sort of, a modern equivalent would be if you got a facial tattoo. (laughs) you're kind of like, setting yourself apart. alright, so saint barbara's dad comes home from the war. and he finds out she's a christian and he gets pissed. and i bet everyone here has had a dad that's been pissed at them. but, saint barbara's dad was way more pissed than your dad. and here's how i know: cause he ordered her to be executed. and whoever's in charge of that kind of thing in micronesia said, "you know, that's cool, but do you think that's harsh enough? maybe saint barbara's dad, you should do the execution" and he was like "yeah, good idea, i didn't think of that one myself." so they were all there in the town square and saint barbara's dad beheaded his own daughter (crowd boos) boo, that's what i say. but the story doesn't end right there, cause he was walking home to, you know, have some sort of party, whatever you do after you execute your own daughter (audience: killer parties!) killer parties, it was a killer party, and uh, the thing is, a bolt of lightning came from the sky, and hit him, and struck him dead. so if you're ever thinking of executing your daughter, don't even. that said, saint barbara's now the patron saint of landmines... or, more specifically, not stepping on a landmine. and this song's called don't let me explode. they said what about los angeles..." - craig finn discussing the story of saint barbara, october 6, 2006, live at the earl, atlanta, GA.

i thought it was pretty cool.

Craig Finn may have a good sense of the geography of the Upper Mid West but his knowledge of the Ancient World leaves something to be desired. Micronesia is a group of thousands of Islands between Hawaii and the Philippines, none of which had contact with Christianity until at least the fifteenth century. St. Barbara lived in Nicomedia, which is in modern-day Turkey.

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