Who's Living In Whose Head Rent-Free Lately?

The phrase “living rent-free in your head” has lived rent-free in my head for some time. Though it was once relegated to self-help types and the very reddest trolls, its usage has expanded in recent months. In the first roundup, we surveyed a distressing variety of skull realty around the world. As of this morning, there’s no longer anything to be done. The phrase has cozied up inside our language. Powerless to stop it, I can merely document its progress as it knocks down the drywall between my lobes, paints over the old wallpaper on my cranium, and radically re-envisions the space.

Tenant: Bryce Harper

Landlord: Tom Boswell

Rent: Free

Tenant: Colby Covington

Landlord: UFC welterweight champion Kamaru Usman

Rent: Free

Tenant: You, potentially

Landlord: A boat without permanent mooring

Rent: Free

Tenant: Ben Simmons

Landlord: The Nets’ zeitgeist(?)

Rent: Free

Tenant: Fictional character Susan Anderson

Landlord: Lexington, N.C. area author Pandora Frank Hamilton

Rent: Free

Tenant: Dirk Nowitzki

Landlord: Dwyane T. Wade Retirement Community

Rent: Free

Tenant: Matthew Tkachuk (maintains pied-à-terre in Drew Doughty)

Landlord: Colorado Avalanche

Rent: Free, for one night only

Tenant: YMCA father Jared Dudley

Landlord: City of Philadelphia

Rent: Free

Tenant: Boston Bruins

Landlord: Toronto Maple Leafs

Rent: Free

Tenant: I suppose it was

Landlord: a matter of time

Rent: but still, c’mon