Interpretations:Let Me Tell You About My Operation

Operation Unsuccessful?

Ha, I guess it would depend on the real goal of the "operation", but based on how vividly he can post-op recall the details of his awful time with this woman, I would say it was an utter failure. "Quick procedure" my foot! Those doctors are quacks! --MisterMe (talk) 11:37, 14 February 2015 (EST)

Get thin scam

This song sounds to me like an ad for some bs get thin scam.

-Echo O_O

Whose Operation?

I really dig this song, but it bugs my brain that the song is about "my" operation but doctors removed "your" memory. I know I should let it go, but if it's "his" operation, shouldn't they have removed "his" memory? -- CJSF (talk) 06:41, 27 May 2015 (EDT)

I think this is the idea: the operation is done to him, but the memory removed is of the woman who was a "poison" to him (i.e., "your" memory--the song is addressed to her). My interp above posits that the operation was unsuccessful, because he can still clearly remember incidents like the time when she threw all his clothes on the lawn, and that she made him feel bad enough to want to excise her from his memory completely. --MisterMe (talk) 07:54, 27 May 2015 (EDT)

Ah.. I see. I was thinking the song was more of someone boasting to anyone and everyone about this great operation he had (sort of a parody on how some people will tell you about these horrible procedures or operations they've had, even though you'd rather nail your scalp to a wall) -- CJSF (talk) 10:26, 27 May 2015 (EDT)

I always thought that it was his partner's memory (of him) that was removed - as if in their earlier relationship he'd made many mistakes and his solution was just to make his partner forget he ever did them. However, now that I re-read the lyrics I think it might make more sense if "your memory" refers to his memories of the partner. --37.44.7.110 20:27, 17 October 2016 (EDT)

Eternal Sunshine

This song reminds me of the movie "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," in which Jim Carrey goes to a doctor to have his memories of his ex-girlfriend removed. Nineteenseventyold (talk) 11:18, 15 October 2016 (EDT)

Obviously a Lobotomy

Okay, when first listening to this song two years ago, I didn't think much of the line "Doctors removed your memory", and was under the assumption that either the singer (the person who the operation was done to) was talking to himself, or that the singer was the doctor who did the operation (singing to the person who had the operation done to them).

However, looking back on this song two years later, the only possible explanation I can think of has become quite clear - the singer is a man (somewhere between the 1940s and the 1960s) singing to his wife, who has just had a lobotomy because of him.

The signs were clear - the old-timey jazz music, etc. - that this didn't take place in "the now." In the 1940s, '50s, and '60s, there were hundreds of thousands of lobotomies performed, most of which on women. Instead of trying to work out psychological or mental problems, many husbands, families, and doctors thought it would literally be easier to basically remove their personality through brain surgery.

The phrase "my operation" would refer to the operation that the singer (the husband) organized and had done to his wife, technically being "his" operation (in that he caused it, knowingly). The "scene" the singer mentions (including "yelling inside" and the person who's sung to "being mean") would be arguments and fights with his wife, which he believes the most efficient way of solving would be a lobotomy. The "poisonous drag" of a "liaison" would be their marriage and relationship, which the doctor would declare would be "better now" after the singer's wife legitimately had her personality removed.

Ya know, it was only "a quick procedure," where the couple (er, mainly the husband) can "find happiness through surgery." Now that there's no chance of arguing with his wife, the singer can now "smile wide" and "sleep the whole day" without a care or being woken up.

The word "memory" (in "Doctors removed your memory") might be figurative, as the doctors in a lobotomy would have removed a lot of the connections to the prefrontal cortex (whose functions are strongly correlated to one's personality and will to live).

Also, the "Très bon!" voice, presumably, would be the doctor after the operation.

Paintspotinfez (talk)

Breakup Scene

Ground floor, screen door, yelling inside
I think you know the scene
Front lawn, break of dawn, clothes on the ground
How could you be so mean?

I think this verse refers to the moment where the narrator was broken up with; being thrown out of the house with all his stuff by a partner who was (in his POV at least) being unreasonable and cruel. The narrator keeps getting reminded of his ex and has to repeat his procedure over and over, so now describing this memory is a pretty regular occurrence. AngleBlueprint (talk) 13:50, 28 July 2020 (EDT)

Rewritten Man

I think this song is about some guy in the 1930s getting abducted by a crooked mad scientist who tried to steal his organs and give him a lobotomy. However, said lobotomy was botched, and it changed the man's personality from a quieter, more reserved person into this bombastic Broadway jazz singer that goes around heel clicking and serenading random people in the street about the operation he failed to forget, almost as if he were a satisfied customer.

- wildstorkmel

Self medication

Nothing cures a broken heart like forgetting yourself.