I'd like to write a note of encouragement to other parody writers. Sometimes when you want to spoof a particular song but can't come up with a good way to do it, it's because the right context hasn't presented itself yet. Way back in 2004, shortly after I joined this site, I got the idea to write parodies of James Bond theme songs. Of course it isn't possible to spoof the entirely instrumental Dr. No theme, but I did succeed with the next two, "From Russia With Love" and "Goldfinger". Then when I got to "Thunderball", I got stuck. I simply couldn't think of a good way to spoof it. More than 16 years later, the context presented itself. My elder daughter's best friend had some hamsters she needed to give away, and we took two (so my younger daughter could have one too). When I spoofed the first two James Bond theme songs, they hadn't even been born! But then I got the idea for "Hamsterball", and upon inspecting the lyrics I saw that some of the ideas fit quite well with my usual style of trying to have some echo of the original. For example, "and he strikes like Thunderball" became "which he strikes with Hamsterball" and it is a very real example of hamster behavior - crashing their balls into walls and other objects. I've had plenty of other pets, and one summer we looked after the hamster of one of the teachers at my daughter's school, but this is the first time we've had hamsters of our own. Mice, gerbils, rats, guinea pigs, rabbits, I've pretty much kept them all, but until now not hamsters. And that's why this idea took 16 years. I'm sure some of you have had similar experiences, though perhaps not over such a long time frame.

You can spoof an instrumental by adding nonsense lyrics to the melody, a la Bill Murray -- Star WARS! Nothing but STAR wars. One time, I spoofed the 'theme songs" to "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "Bewitched" and "Leave It To Beaver" by adding lyrics to the music

I've done it once: the part where the devil played the violin in "The Devil Went Down to Georgia". But to me that's the exception rather than the rule. I've also thought of turning "Tequila" into "Chihuahua", but that would be more suitable for a video.

The orchestral score for "2001" is actually Johann Strauss's "Thus Spake Zarasthustra" hence ....... Thus .. Spake .. ZARASTHUSTRA! -- He SPAKE to me and he SPAKE thusly ..... Thus .. spake .. ZARASTHUSTRA -- Monkey KILLS with bone then BONE becomes ship