| Straight
from the holler.
by "Buck" July 1, 2005 The
talk about the kids show on Channel 3 got my cogs to turning the other
day and I recalled being a guest on Romper Room at the tender age of
four. Romper Room was
apparently one of those kids’ shows that were sort of at the
discretion of the station. You
know, there was the Romper Room template that was used in a lot of
markets and you can make of it what you will, customize it for your
market. Mom and I went to
the studios of WCYB-TV in I remember there were about ten of us kids to be on the day’s show, but I don’t remember a whole lot about it. I know we started and ended the show sitting at a table and playing. I recall Miss Ann letting us go to the shelf and get a toy. I had already spotted a Tonka road grader, and Miss Ann’s appearance had already heightened my testosterone level to dangerous proportions—so I was ready to run some heavy equipment. Trouble was, the boy beside me wanted it too. I grabbed it and he tried to get it out of my hand. I remember punching him in the side of the head. No words—just a flat out sucker punch from nowhere. The kid immediately started crying on TV, so I did what any red-blooded American boy with manhood coursing through his veins would do. I punched him again, harder. My mom was situated in an overhead booth with a glass front with the other moms watching the show unfold. I recall her coming out and grabbing me and threatening to spank me then and there. That was humiliation I could do without. I mean, I’ve got smoking hot Miss Ann and I’m doing all I can to find out what’s up that dress—at age four—and here comes Mom with a belt on live television. This could only happen to me. The only other shit I recall was we drank Kool-Aid in cups from Hardee’s. Hardee’s was a big sponsor of this thing, and this was before Hardee’s even began it’s ascent from obscurity—of course it went way up there and has now come crashing down. But in those days there probably weren’t 10 Hardee's in the entire world. I know I’d never eaten there before Romper Room. Scary
movies as a child, as you can imagine, I have a story.
I remember my grandmother taking me to see “It’s Alive.”
It was a story about some baby that was born with claws and
teeth. It went crazy and
killed everybody in the delivery room, tore its way out a window and
proceeded to kill and eat people all over town.
It eventually ate 50 pounds of beef out of a refrigerator.
Crazy. I was in
third grade and it was the first time I’d ever seen a movie above a
Disney animated film. It
was a real eye-opener and scared the living fuck out of me.
It was a low-grade “B” horror flick, and I don’t even
remember the actors. I do
remember however they wound up shooting the little bundle of joy after
its dad had it wrapped in a raincoat going all crazy and shit—then
threw it on the punk-ass cop who’d been a dick.
As they were leaving, the police hero got a call and the last
line of the movie was, “There’s been another one born in Do
you remember those old Mountain Dew commercials where a bunch of young
folks are swimming in some high mountain stream?
The guys are all buff and tearing off their shirts and the girls
are wearing Daisy Duke shorts and Hee Haw halter tops, jumping off logs
into icy cold water. The
commercial was on television in the 1970’s.
I found out later in life, once I hit high school, that the cast
of characters was actually a bunch of students from one of the schools
nearby ( I
actually have a story about a high mountain creek walk from my recently
unveiled collection “How on Earth Did I Survive to Adulthood?”
I’ll share it with you in a few days.
I’m considering creating a special collection of this insanity
that Mr. Kay can hopefully make part of “The Best of the WVSR.”
I doubt these anecdotes will rank up there with Ryan’s Macaroni
and Beef, but a man can always shoot for the brass ring. |
