You Know You’ve Been in Band too Long When

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• You start sleeping with your instrument.
• You have to take out your dentures to play.
• You can identify yourself in a band picture.
• Your career is baby-sitting the director’s kids.
• The sole of your band shoe falls off during a parade.
• The director starts to sing well.
• You consider your drill charts a fashion accessory.
• You can eat Chinese food with your drumsticks.
• Someone hands you a piece of paper and the first thing you do with it is roll it up and put it in your pocket.
• The choice is not regular or diet, but woodwind or brass.
• You shake your head and your lips follow three seconds later.
• You know everyone else’s part.
• Dinner conversation is focused around new music or drill charts.
• You start listening to band music all day.
• Being mauled by a drum is a normal part of life.
• The saxes sound like they’re improving.
• The flutes are in tune.
• You can play up to tempo on YOUR instrument.
• You walk with a roll step.
• People worry when they see you without your instrument.
• You start using band jokes on people outside the band.
• Your instrument begins to grow hair.
• "Armed guard" means a girl with a pole instead of a man with a gun.
• The worst four-letter word you can think of is B-A-N-D.
• You know how many ceiling tiles there are from waiting for the trumpets to learn their parts.
• You know how many sound panels there are from waiting for the drummers to GET their parts.
• You pivot on every corner.
• The band goes on a road trip and no buses break down.
• Someone says "block" and you immediately drop whatever you are doing and go running off somewhere.
• You beg the director for extra early morning rehearsals.
• You can dress in 15 seconds.
• Back marching no longer reminds you of ballet.
• Instead of political campaigns or soap operas, you follow section intrigue.
• You can sing your part to a show more than three years old.
• You start criticizing the bands on televised parades.
• The flutes are in tune.
• You wear your uniform to any concert even though you are not in it.
• Your band shoes no longer hurt.
• You try to teach your three-month-old sister to play the flute.
• You feel homicidal towards a rookie who says, "Oh, goodie! Another parade!"
• You name your kids Mark and Time.
• Your teachers excuse your mistakes with, "It’s all right, the poor thing’s in band."
• The band is in step.
• Drummers respect percussionists.
• You call your wife/husband to say you’ll be late because of band practice.
• Marking time is your favorite form of exercise.
• Your instrument/hat/uniform has a name and personality all its own.
• Anything on this list makes sense.
• Cold hot dogs, warm Coke and stale popcorn are gourmet meals.
• You consider being a band director.
• The flutes are in tune.
• You are going around a corner with a group of friends and you think, “Don’t swing out!”
• Numbers past 8 don’t matter.
• You hope the football team loses so you won’t have to go to the playoffs.
• Duct tape is an essential part of your instrument/uniform.
• You can make brown shoes look white.
• A line that’s supposed to be straight is straight. (rather than beautifully curved)
• You can sleep through drumline sectionals.
• You have a neckstrap/drum harness tan line. (And don’t consider it strange.)
• Letters past G don’t matter.
• The sideline and the band are in tune.
• There’s a straight diagonal anywhere on the field.
• You subconsciously start practicing fingerings on a pencil.
• You consider moving into the band room.
• You roll-step to avoid spilling food.
• You sing drum cadences while walking to class.
• Everyone but you knows what happened on your date.
• All your friends make band jokes.
• Slides no longer make your back ache.
• You come home from rehearsal and your mother/roommate says, “You look familiar.”
• Your pants fall off and you keep going like nothing happened.
• Everyone wants to kill the other football team... and you want to kill the other band.
• You accidentally call the director “Dad”.
• You show up fifteen minutes early for everything.
• You hear music and you start marking time.
• You actually CAN sight-read.
• You walk behind someone and are in step with them.
• A bus seat is as comfortable as your bed.
• You’ve dated every member of the opposite sex in the band.
• You’ve had a trombone-related head injury.
• Your buses are named. (ie “Command Central, Drum Bus, Tuba Bus, Shako Bus, Rude Bus, Library Bus, Tweetle Bus, G Bus...)
• The drumline can read music.
• The worst torture implements you can think of are trumpets and piccolos.
• There’s a stand in the bandroom that ISN’T broken.
• You regard tuba players as a separate species.
• You point out key changes and dynamics on the radio.
• People ask you about your social life and you say, “You mean my flute/trumpet/tuba/drum/etc.?”
• You can guide off reflections in your bell.
• You think your plume is alive. (“The chicken is attacking me! AAAAHHH!!!”)
• You’ve ever been able to hear a soloist.
• You can count by eight as easily as by ten.
• You can remember your music in the middle of an exam, but can’t remember what class you’re in.
• The trumpets make it through a show without ad-libbing.
• The sideline and the band agree on the tempo.
• You actually have all of pregame memorized.
• Reeds taste good.
• You start coming up with new words to fight songs, both your own and other people’s.
• The buses leave on time.
• The pit gets their equipment on the field or put away in less than half an hour.
• The director’s jokes are funny.
• Trombones realize there’s more to dynamics than ON and OFF.
• The buses get home on time.
• You give a drummer four steps of clearance even when he’s not carrying his drum.
• You start adding stuff to this list.