Have you heard Annie yet?

Earlier this month I wanted to download Annie Lennox's new album, Songs of Mass Destruction, as soon as it was available on a certain website that starts with a lowercase "i". However, my little men demanded I buy an actual CD (how 1990's of them) so they could "look at the cover". I promised I would print off the cover from the download. I was informed that wasn't good enough.

So I was caught cutting out of a meeting near City Hall a bit early to run into a music store before another meeting at the State House. I confessed to the fellow I knew (who had also cut out of the same meeting) my dilemma and he immediately understood, even offered sympathy.

Hours later and after the train ride to the car, I finally got to tear open the plastic covering the case (again, how 1990's) and popped it into the van stereo. What surrounded me was delicious, sultry and pained. Bizarrely catchy and angst-ridden. Full of meaning and fun. Oh Annie, I've missed you.

As I picked the boys up at after school care I told them what was waiting for them in the car. "She's in the CD player." Their eyes were wide. They ran to the van.

They demanded to see the case. There was a moment of silence.

"Isn't she beautiful?" One says with breathless reverence.

Yes son, she is.