A cheery little song with a vaguely Caribbean beat (a samba?), sung by Anne Murray on her children's album of the same name. I had it on vinyl, and one of the reasons vinyl is better than CDs is that there is no "repeat" function on record players. Children, myself included, love repetition, especially when something is silly, or has a catchy tune. Children, myself included, love repetition, especially when something is silly, or has a catchy tune. This has silly lyrics that kids pick up very quickly, a toe-tapping melody, and a great sing-along chorus... it is so addictive even at the ripe age of 22 that I tracked it down on Napster just so I could have an MP3 of it.
The chorus is a short run of tall tales that a child would tell: a dragon here, a grizzly there, and you'd better come quick because we all know something this fantastic can't last. The two verses are from the parent's perspective and are relatively content-free -- The kid tells tall tales, who am I to question them, and so forth -- with one important exception. In my opinion (then and now) the song reaches its humor pinnacle with the line "if there's dragons in this neighborhood, then we're gonna leave." Play the song for your kid and maybe they'll love it; maybe you'll get asked to play it again. It's pretty much fluff with a catchy tune, but maybe They Might Be Giants will do a cover of it and breathe some fire back into it.
I would also like to apologize to my parents for all the times I pulled them away from reality to tell them there was a hippo in our bathtub, and thank them for coming to check every time anyway.
"Hey,
daddy, there's a
dragon in the
driveway!
Momma, there's a
grizzly on the lawn!
You better come quick, 'cause there's a
hippo in the
bathtub,
and he's going down the drain--Oh, no!--he's gone."
Well the minds of little children,
they go round and round and round,
hearin' the
giants' footsteps
when I never hear a sound.
I just hear,
"Hey,
daddy, there's a
dragon in the
driveway!
Momma, there's a
grizzly on the lawn!
You better come quick, 'cause there's a
hippo in the
bathtub,
and he's going down the drain--Oh, no!--he's gone."
Well, you never know if they really saw
all the things they'd have you believe,
but if there's
dragons in this neighborhood,
then we're gonna leave,
singin', "Hey,
daddy, there's a
dragon in the
driveway!
Momma, there's a
grizzly on the lawn!
You better come quick, 'cause there's a
hippo in the
bathtub,
and he's going down the drain--Oh, no!--he's gone."