Saturday, January 2, 2010

Character Flaws

Before you go judging me on this, I just want to let you know a couple of things:

1. My toddler days were the late 60's and very early 70's.

2. We only had 3 channels back then and didn't get a public television station.

3. We currently don't have television and therefore don't watch Sesame Street.

That being said I was a bit thrown for a loop New Years morning when Lukas brought me an Elmo book and asked me to read it to him.

"Oh, Big Bird" he said as he looked at the page below. "Yes, and there is Cookie Monster" I replied as I pointed to the blue thing eating a cookie. I felt informed.

"Who is that?" he then asked as he pointed to the character jumping rope.


"Uh, I'm not sure buddy. I think it is Elmo's girlfriend." It seemed like a logical guess to me.

"Who are those guys?' was his next question, as we flipped the page.

"Well, that's Bert and Ernie" happy to get an easy one. "But, I'm not sure which one is which".


"There's Elmo!" he happily said as we turned the page. "And Grover!" "Who is that guy?" he then asked, pointing to the vampire character.

"Uh, I think it's Count Chocula" was my best guess.

"And that guy?" as we moved on to the next image.

"Err...I think that must be the Dump Monster"

"Oh."

"And who is THAT?" he cried, as we turned to the final page.

"Honestly buddy....I have NO idea who that is."

"Looks a bit like a mash-up between Grover and the Cookie Monster"

"Oh, ok Daddy"

26 comments:

Chris Singer said...

Good stuff! I've been recently re-introduced to Sesame Street. They have tons of clips on their website (with the names of the characters for refernce). You can even watch Adam Sandler sing a song about Elmo or watch Elmo jam with the GooGoo Dolls...

Anonymous said...

Lol you're making me work!
Zoe is jumping rope. Bert is yellow, Ernie is orange, you MUST know Oscar the Grouch and the last pic of the blue monster is Herry monster. Also, the dog in the 1st pic is Barkley.
Did I miss anything?
You're welcome, signed TBS, former Director of Content for Sesame Street ;)

Anonymous said...

Count Von count is the one I missed.

Anonymous said...

I think you'll still pass the true test of fatherhood...despite your flaws about knowledge of PBS shows. You would really fail the Sponge Bob test.

Not From Lapland said...

I didn't grow up in the 70's, we did have TV and I probably at some point in my life have watched Sesame Street and I still think you did better than I could have.

McMommy said...

Look, I don't want to scare you or anything....but you were about to get your Parenting License repealed on this one! I didn't want to have to do it, but you were giving me no choice. Lucky for you, you have the former Director of Sesame Street content reading your blog. So I'll let this one slide, ok?
Now mosey along...and go find out who Abby Cadabby is before your next quiz.

ericdbolton said...

yeah, I couldn't tell you who the orange chick monster is.

All my experience from Sesame Street comes from watching it myself. My kids haven't watched it and wouldn't know who they were either..

Kori said...

After having recently gotten television after 9 years (and four kids) without it, I get this. We do watch it now, but man, I miss my non-tv days, seriously!

DGB said...

Ha...that's awesome!

I too have no idea who that last guy is either. Although I was raised on Sesame Street, I can't bring myself to put my kids in front of it now that it's become the Elmo show.

Captain Dumbass said...

That is very sad, James, you need to start watching a lot more tv. Think of your child.

Jason @ The Devoted Dad said...

I didn't watch Sesame Street as a child either. I have caught up though- I see you will be catching up too, Hah! Good Luck!

Anonymous said...

Ha! That's funny. I didn't know what Zoe or Abby Cadaby were either. For some reason my wife is up to date on all the Sesame Street characters. Fortunately, my son prefers 'Mo and 'Kie.

SciFi Dad said...

What kind of person doesn't know the difference between Bert and Ernie?!?

I'll give you everyone else (even the Count, which really is a gift) but come ON dude.

I'm embarrassed for you.

Seriously.

Ed said...

I'm not judging you....

but Dude!!!

Lady Mama said...

You guessed better than I would have. I'm not sure whether it's because I grew up in England or because I didn't watch much telly, but I've no idea who most of the characters on Sesame Street are!

Shelle-BlokThoughts said...

I don't even know some of those and I watched Sesame STreet all the time when I was a toddler-- :)

Fun Blog!

WeaselMomma said...

Dude. I think Obama has enacted a program to get TVs and cable service, complete with PBS, to all of those not fortunate enough to have them. You know in the name of furthering pop culture trivia and because Sesame Street is too big to fail.
Sign up, for the kids sake.

Mrs. M said...

That last one is Herry, but I see you've already been duly informed. :)

DCUrbanDad said...

I am gonna repeat what a few others have said. DUDE!!!!

Irrational Dad said...

Reading books to Tyler has helped me discover how little I know. I've never read or heard the Cat in the Hat before I had Tyler. Same with many of his other books. I sometimes want to strangle my parents for not reading to me.

Anonymous said...

I have to admit I didn't know all those characters either and I loved Seseme Street as a kid. I'm just in the stage of reading potty training books to my kiddo... those things bring up a lot of questions I wasn't prepared for!

WILLIAM said...

Good post. I am amazed at how Sesame has changed over the years, but I am glad the core characters have stuck.

Count Chocula....hah.

Slamdunk said...

Ha, I have to confess I know way too much about kids tv programming. Even "Harry Monster" in your last image, is a familiar face from around here.

FilmFather said...

Okay, that's it...I'm sending you a plane ticket to NYC, a 2010 Census form, and a map to Sesame Street.

A Free Man said...

I'm the same way, don't know any of the new Sesame Street characters - though I do know Oscar - but my defense is that we don't get much sesame street down here.

Homemaker Man said...

Dude. I . . . dude.