I Can Do Without You

"I Can Do Without You" is a popular song, with music by Sammy Fain and lyrics by Paul Francis Webster.

The song was included in the in the 1953 film, Calamity Jane. It was performed by Doris Day and Howard Keel. Doris Day played the lead in the film as Calamity Jane, while Howard Keel played her nemesis and eventual love interest, Bill Hickok.

The song proceeds from a scene in which Calamity is thrown off-kilter by apparent praise from Hickok after she promises to bring the actress Adelaide Adams from Chicago to Deadwood City. It turns out that Hickok was being sarcastic and that he trusts her "about as much as I do a blind rattlesnake with a new button on its tail." The song is a comical male-female quarrel, with Calamity and Hickok exchanging comic insults, somewhat reminiscent of Anything You Can Do from Annie Get Your Gun.

Lyrics

Calamity:

In the summer, you're the winter;
In the finger, you're the splinter;
In the banquet, you're the stew; say,
I can do without you!

Hickok:

In the garden, you're the gopher;
In the Levi's, you're the loafer;
Like an overturned canoe, well--
I can do without you!

Calamity:

You can go to ... Philadelphia!
Take a hack to Hackensack! Hey--
I'll never ring a bell for ya,
Or yell for ya to come back!

Hickok:

In the question, you're the "why";
In the ointment, you're the fly--

Calamity:

Though I know some things are indispensable -
Like a buck or two -
If there's one thing I can do without,
I can do without you!

Hickok:

In a barrel, you're a pickle;
In a gold mine, you're a nickel;
You're the tack inside my shoe, yeah--
I can do without you!

Calamity:

In my bosom, you're a dagger;
You're a mangy carpetbagger;
In the theatre, you're the boo--
I can do without you!

Hickok:

You've got charm that ain't bewitchin' me,
You have a face that no one would paint--

Calamity:

I've got the darnedest itch in me,
To be wherever you ain't!

Hickok:

In a bullfrog, you're the croak--

Calamity:

In the forest, poison oak--

Hickok:

Though I know something are necessary,
My half-pint buckaroo,
If there's one thing I can without,
I can do without you!

Calamity:

You're a knothead!

Hickok:

You're a faker!

Calamity:

You're a bonehead!

Hickok:

Troublemaker!

[Both take their guns out and glare at each other]

Calamity & Hickok:

I can do without you!

External links