Stupid

Yeah. I recently read that it was based on some humiliating experience that Glen Phillips went through. Though, it didn't go into specifics.

Sorry to tell you this, but you're waaaaay off the mark with the whole racist take. It doesn't say "bigut2" on the cd sleeve- it's just the word "stupid" spelled backwards. The "s" and the "d" are also backwards. I think this song is just about a guy who hired some guy to do some work around his house, not realizing his girlfriend/wife had dated him at one point, so he feels stupid.

I have to agree with skinnypanda & Bravura - saw Toad perform this at a radio festival way back in 1995 and Glen Phillips said with a smile it was based on "an encounter with a handyman".

I love this song. Sounds to me like it's about a guy (the narrator) who's been working on finishing up his house with this other guy. And it just so happens that this other guy has been with the narrator's lady. He's singing about how he didn't notice until later that they had been together, thus making him feel "really stupid now".

I vaguely remember reading in a Toad the Wet Sprocket forum the backstory for this song. Something about Glen acting like a snot towards a repairman and now he regrets it. Although, I'm not sure how the line "she says she knew him once" works into that.

I think this song is about a man (the narrator) that is having an african american guy come fix his house. Now, next to the song title, it says bigut2, and a "bigot" is a racist person. And he says to his wife "I am feeling really stupid now" because the whole time he was probably talking bad about blacks and she "knew" this carpenter once meaning she had dated him before. And the narrator, being a bigot, never expected that from his wife.

I was expecting and hoping to find a lot of comments on what this song is about, because it's certainly intriguing. It seems to be about knowing a guy and eventually realizing he's not what you thought he was - he's something wrong, something troubling, a bigot, or a wifebeater. Quite possibly a rapist. It definitely gives off the impression that it's about a real and specific person. Again, intriguing. Great tune.

I think it’s about a guy whose wife cheats on him with the handyman. He basically ignores the handyman, because he’s just a handyman, beneath him. Then his wife sleeps with him, and he recalls her saying she once knew him….and the narrator feels like a total idiot, like he “should have known.”

I agree it's about the wife cheating on him, but not once. I think it's over a period of time. In my experience, when the very first time you find out your SO is unhappy is when you find out they've been cheating, you feel really, really, really stupid. It's shocking - "blinding" - and you go into your own type of PTSD when it comes out of nowhere. "Ooh, I didn't expect that from you." You had this person on a pedestal, and you never expected this.

"This song is about infidelity and home repairs" -Dean Dinning, Stevens Point Wisconsin 1 July 2011

[Edit: TQez]