Cinderella dressed in yella

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

went downstairs to kiss a fella,
made a mistake, kissed a snake
how many doctors did it take
salt, vinegar, mustard, pepper!

I have this stuck in my head. Do little girls still skip rope? Skipping rope and shouting out the various skipping songs made up most of our play time when we were little. Then we all got that lemon thing and a dozen or so of us would all hop around the neighbourhood, swinging the lemon around our ankles.

I can’t think of anymore of the songs though. I remember one about a race car I think. I wonder why the heck they all end with “salt, vinegar, mustard, pepper!”. And why did we skip as fast as we could on “pepper”. Little girls are funny.
Wow, really didn’t mean to put this in Great Debates. Could a mod move it please?

2

Flashing on a classic Avram Davidson fantasy short story, “My Boyfriend’s Name is Jello.”

3

Website: Chants and Taunts, Clapping Games, and Jump Rope Rhymes.

4

We used:

Cinderella dressed in yella
Went downtown to see her fella
On the way her girdle busted
How many people were disgusted?

Then the jumprope got turned REAL fast and we counted by fives until we missed.

There was another about Tiny Tim the Monkey but that is way too long to type.

5

nm

6

Excuse me, she went upstairs to kiss a fella- that’s why it was so scandalous!

I remember doing a unit on traditional rhymes in high school English. It was interesting to see how the Cinderella rhyme changed over time to get more and more risque. Originally she went downtown, then downstairs, then upstairs. Earlier versions involved a wardrobe malfunction, later versions involved kissing.

7

And here we little girls had no idea we were singing about some floozy!

How about Miss Polly? That one we knew was bad because you almost say “ass” and “hell” :eek:

8

The other day, I had
*
Miss Mary Mack, Mack, Mack
All dressed in black, black, black
With silver buttons, buttons, buttons
All down her back, back, back*

stuck in my head. Being as I haven’t heard that since, oh, 6th grade (c. 1978), I wonder how it got there?

9

Not a jumprope game, but:

Stella Stella ola, clap clap clap
Singing S Chico Chico, Chico Chico crackerjack
S Chico Chico, I owe, I owe, I’ve gotta blow my nose
So 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

10

Ah yes.

*Miss Suzy had a steamboat, the steamboat had a bell
When Suzy went to heaven, the steamboat went to

Hello operator, please give me number 9
And if you disconnect me, I’ll kick you in

**Behind **the yellow curtain there was a piece of glass
Miss Suzy sat upon it and hurt her big fat

Ask me no more questions, I’ll tell you no more lies
The boys are in the bathroom doing up their

Flies are in the city, the bees are in the park
The boys and girls are having fun and necking in the dark-dark-dark!*

11

I loved the lemon thing! I was totally the coolest kid in the neighborhood for exactly two days when my parents bought me one and NO ONE else had one!

12

Oops, too late

13

I knew it as:

Cinderella, dressed in yella
went up stairs to kiss her fella
by mistake she kissed a snake
how many doctors will it take?
(keep counting and going faster until you miss)
I also liked:

A sailor went to sea sea sea
To see what he could see see see
And all that he could see see see
Was the bottom of the deep blue sea sea sea.

That was a clapping game. You’d alternate between clapping your hands together, then right hand clap with the girl across from you, then left hand, then clap your hads together. Then each time you got to “see see see”, you’d do a straight across clap, then back of the hand clap, then clap.

I think I’d be a bit young for these things (I’m 28, so not a kid anymore, but we had the video games and everything ;)), but maybe part of it was going to a Catholic grade school where there was no playground. We only had empty parking lots to go to at recess and that’s where I learned all my jump rope and clap rhymes.

14

That’s the one my daughter used, upstairs and counting. That’s within the last year, for any visiting scholars.

15

I remember something along the lines of:

Not last night
But the night before
A pickle and an onion
Came knocking at the door.
I asked them what they wanted
And this is what they said

Spanish dancer do the splits
The kicks
Turn around
Touch the ground
Spanish dancer, get out of town

Spanish dancer
Come on back
Sit on a tack

…

And that’s where my mind runs out…

Somewhere along the line you got to red hot peppers…

16

Here’s what I remember:

Not last night but the night before
44 robbers came knocking at the door
As I ran out [run out of jumprope]
They … ran … in [run back into rope]

And this is what they said to me:

Spanish Dancer, turn around [turn]
Spanish Dance, touch the group [touch ground]
Spanish Dancer, turn out the light [close eyes]
Spanish Dancer, spell goodnight
G O O D N I G H T [rope turns faster on each letter]
Goodnight! [run out, avoid spanking by rope]

bows

Also a Catholic grade school graduate!

17

My mother and your mother were hanging out the clothes
My mother gave your mother a punch on the nose
What colour was the blood?
R E D spells red
So out of this game you must go
Whether you like it … or not!

18

Whenever we jumped rope “pepper” always meant going really fast.
Anybody ever get the hang of “double dutch”, where two ropes are going in opposite directions at the same time?

19

I loved double dutch! And criss-cross! And double jumps! And backward criss-cross…oooohhh fancy!

20

For us, 24 robbers came knocking at the door.

followed by:

As I ran out, they ran in,
And I hit them on the head with a rolling pin.

Then all the Spanish dancer orders.