mr jinx and miss lucy

[Dr George Christos]

i originally thought that mr jinx and miss lucy referred to bad luck and
good luck, but i now think that they are fictitious characters to
represent all of dylan's (or grady in 'wonder boys') friends. the fact
that they have jumped in the lake means they all pissed off, got lost,
given up on him (no one in front and nothing behind). he's on is own,
it's out of his control (out of range), he's vunerable (people are crazy
times and times are strange), he doesn't really care (he use to care but
things have changed & when you got nothing you got nothing to lose).
then again he would prefer not to make another mistake (cause he has no
friends to help him, and he knows well that when you've got nothing left
you'll discover you can always lose a little bit more).

Mr. Jinx and Miss Lucy, they jumped in the lake
I'm not that eager to make a mistake
People are crazy and times are strange
I'm locked in tight, I'm out of range
I used to care, but things have changed

--
Dr George Christos
Department of Mathematics and Statistics
Curtin University of Technology
GPO BOX U1987
Perth WA 6845
Australia
Research:neural networks,adaptive systems,brain function,
REM sleep,chaos theory,evolutionary computation
website: http://www.cs.curtin.edu.au/~christos

[ther...@gmail.com]

This song is a favorite of mine and the older I get the more it resonates. I think the Jinx/Lucy reference is to the cartoon character Mr. Jinx and the Miss Lucy of children's rhymes (in rhymes of kids in the States, at least). If those references are correct, then the line is about children's characters having done what adults do as a sign of indifference or indignation or feeling at wits end. In other words, the lyric is about characters associated with innocence, childhood and child's play behaving losing that innocence and light heartedness by doing something only adults (unhinged adults, or adults who are past apathy) do.

This interpretation certainly fits with the overall themes of the song.