ROFL!!! I always sing the sugar beet song to myself when I have to buy sugar at the grocery store!
Another good song I remember was about teaching kids not to litter, and the chorus was “And if every kid did it, look and see what a dirty, messed-up, trashy world it would be…YUCK!” (or something along those lines) and it pulled back to show the earth all covered in brown goo. That made quite an impression on me!
For some reason I remember the “Loaf of bread, a container of milk, and a stick of butter” and the one with the get getting lost as being the same skit. He passed like a really weird clock and stuff, and when he got back to the store he had to think past all the really weird stuff he passed backwards until he got to his mom telling him what to buy. That’s why he was so excited, because he remembered ALL that weird crap! lol. (I could be wrong, though.)
It was an animated sketch where a little girl was sent to the store by her mother. She was supposed to get “a loaf of bread, a container of milk, and a stick of butter.” IIRC, the mother asked her if she needed to write it down but she said she could remember. Of course when she got to the store she couldn’t. I think the cartoon then illustrated her remembering with a thought balloon and a replay of her mother’s voice. The little girl gets all excited, “I remembered! I remembered!” The list of items is repeated several times through the sketch, which is why WE all remember it, I think
Jodi: Your “remedial Sesame Street” story is jumpin’-up-and-down hilarious. (I can’t bring myself to actually swear in a Sesame Street thread.)
What a great thread. So many memories here. Phone! Phone! Bbrbrbrring! – EERRRRNIIEE! – Scram! etc.
When I was in college, I happened to tune in to see Meryl Sheep talking to guest star Susan Sarandon. Susan helped Meryl with an acting exercise by reciting the alphabet with emotional qualities called out by Meryl. I just about fell off the couch.
I think my favorite Ernie and Bert sketch (that I remember, anyway) had them camping. They were looking up at the stars and Ernie wouldn’t let Bert sleep. Oh my God, I could identify with me and my brother. …Oh wait, there was another Ernie and Bert sketch that had Ernie going to the door or something, and Bert didn’t believe there was a monster or a pirate or something outside… I can’t remember it! AARRRGH!
But as funny as the show could be (and still is), I also have to make mention of the “eerie” moments. One of those is Ernie’s song “I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon.” I’m getting chills just thinking about it.
But better yet was “Elmo and the Lavender Moon.” I’m not the biggest Elmo fan (though I understand his popularity among younger kids, and I think it’s cool that the puppeteer who does him is black), but this song just killed me. Made my hair stand up on end. A beautiful, simple, haunting song by Los Lobos (I think), with Elmo dancing in otherworldly happiness (and never speaking, which contributes to my enjoyment). Goosebump city.
Oh, and I’m one who says Grover is the best individual character. “Monster in the Mirror” – totally hysterical.
Thanks, CERVAISE. Yeah, it was pretty funny at the time.
I like Elmo, even though my experience with him was as a nanny (back in the day), not as a kid. I remember one episode where he had new shoes and he went all through the neighborhood showing them off and telling people “Elmo got new shoes!” But the thing I remember as being most funny was that the shoes were a pair of those great big over-sized hightops – a perfect parody on all those huge pump-'em-up, “make your feet look like they weigh ten pounds each” sneakers.
Oh! And I love the way Grover used to dance – this is a sight gag but still – he’d get all revved up and he’d put his purple head down and twist back and forth so those boneless muppet arms would just windmill back and forth – I’m cracking up just thinking about it. Jeez, I haven’t thought of this stuff for years.
I wish I had Ernie and Bert puppets so I could do my own skits…
Anyhoo, I love them both - they are the perfect odd couple. I remember once Ernie dressing up as a Doctor, and giving Bert an examination. Lots of ‘uh-huh’ and 'hmmmmmm’s come from Ernie as he looks concerned. Bert asks for a diagnosis, but Ernie says he’ll have to wait a while for that. First he has six years of grade school, 7 years of high school, 8 years of college, 6 years of Medical School…
And Stevie Wonder performing “Supersitious” rocks. If I were a pop star, I’d give my eye teeth to be on that show. Not to keen on REM’s bit - Stipe looked unhealthy that day and might have scared some kids.
BTW - I was born the same year SS went on the air, so I literally grew up with the show.
Wow, great memories you guys are bringing back! I always loved the songs the best, as is evidenced by my MP3 collection - I have a number of Sesame Street songs, such as the opening theme, Big Bird’s alphabet song, and “It’s Not Easy Being Green”, which is, IMHO, one of the best songs ever, period. I was maybe four or five when Maria and Luis and Bob and all the humans could see Snuffy for the first time, and being shocked that Big Bird had been telling the truth - you can guess my age from that. Even more than the onetwothreefourfive, sixseveneightnineten, eleventwelve, I liked the marble obstacle course thing. You know, where the marble goes down all those ramps and over wheels and such? That completely fascinated me when I was little.
But one of my favorite SS skits is pretty recent, spotted while channel surfing. It was truly surreal. Ben Stiller was dressed up as cheese - a big orange box with Swiss cheese holes - singing “Cheese is a Person in your Neighborhood”, while Elmo cried “No! Ben, no! Cheese isn’t a person! Cheese isn’t a person!” Hilarious.
Jim Henson’s company did the puppets for Star Wars, so you aren’t imagining anything. Frank Oz did both of the voices, I believe.
Anyone remember that superhero who was a little guy stuck on a cup? And he would go on adventures around the kitchen? I think there was one where a little boy was scared to cross the “street”.
I also had a set of children’s storybooks featuring the Sesame Street characters. My favorite was “The Monster at the End of the Book.” It featured Grover, who was terrified of the monster at the end of the book, and did anything to stop you from turning the pages. It had illustrations of him nailing the pages together, building brick walls, and tying the book shut. Every time you turned the page whatever he had built on the last page was a pile of rubble. He kept saying, “Stop turning pages! Do you have any idea what kind of a mess you are making?” It turned out that he was the monster at the end of the book. It’s fun to read these books and hear the characters’ voices in your head.
I learned irony from Cowboy X. “And they all lived happily ever after, because they weren’t very smart.” I can remember being five and thinking how strange that was.
Grover’s best bit as a waiter: trying to get a bawk bawk bawk bawk-awk sandwich.
Forgetful Jones and Cookie Monster are always good. I have fond memories of Big Bird in China hanging out with the little girl and the Monkey King.
Definitely Ladybug Picnic, Alligator King and Capital I are old favs.
Since fatherhood, I’ve been sampling some of the new repertoire, though. I’m happy to report that there’s lots of excellent new material.
Two which come to mind are:
Cereal Girl: “I said I’d taste it, I’ll give it a whirl, and now I am a cereal girl.”-To the tune of Material Girl
Slimy To the Moon: Slimy is Oscar’s pet worm. He headed a mission to the moon along with a bunch of other worms (Albert Slimestein was the scientific advisor IIRC). In the episode featuring this song, Big Bird and Tony Bennet are on the rooftop looking at the sky, wondering about the worms’ whereabouts. Suddenly T. Bennet breaks into Slimy to the Moon (to the tune of Fly Me to the Moon)
The red typewriter guy!!! What a trip it was to remember HIM–literally haven’t thought of that guy in decades, only to have it all come zooming back to me…NOO-NEE-NOO…
Do any of you remember that skit with the monsters illustrating all, none, and some? It had the coolest scat music. First, there were no monsters and you’d hear “none of us are here.” Then a few would wander in: “some of us are here.” Then TONS would come on, and a monster would get all right up in your face and scream “ALL of the monsters and ALL of the [somethings] and ALL of the [something elses] are here!” as fast as he could. A very hepped-up, almost bi-polar sketch. I loved it.
No one’s mentioned Bert and the letter W-appreciation society. I thought the words to this one were especially clever: “Oh, what is the letter we love? What sound are we extra-fond of? It’s not any trouble; you know it’s a ‘w’ when you hear ‘whu-whu-whu-whu’!” And all the muppets at the society meeting would sway back and forth. There was a cool line about how “waffles would be just awful” without “w,” and another one about how “‘we’ would be ‘e,’ don’t you see?”
Super Grover was my favorite. I loved his manic scream that would start small and then build, and my anticipation would reach a feverish pitch until he came crashing down from the sky and demolished the entire set. I LOVED that. I also liked the fact that he was utterly incompetent at fixing the problems he was called in for; the other muppets figured everything out themselves.
Speaking of the new stuff: I once saw Jim Carrey on there doing a skit about “happy feet.” (I only saw this once, many years ago, so the details may not be completely accurate). He told Elmo that he could only dance when his feet were happy, and then launched himself into this completely insane blur of a dance. He just threw his body around and almost gave himself a concussion. Elmo watched quietly, and then deadpanned, “You’re really weird.” I fell over laughing.
(Incidentally, my screen name came about because of my favorite muppet: Dr. Teeth of the Electric Mayhem fame).
Teeny Little Superguy,
pops right up before your eyes.
He’s no bigger than my thumb
“Snap your fingers, here I come.”
(“Now stop me if you’ve heard this one”)
You can’t tell a hero by his size,
he’s just a teeny little superguyyyyy…
All of the Tom Lehrer stuff was Electric Company, also. It’s amazing how easy it is to get skits from the two mixed up.
The “loaf of bread, container of milk, and a stick of butter” one is one of my favorites. I’ll still come out with that at 30 whenever one of my friends gives their SO a grocery list while I’m visiting.
And the little girl with the balloon. “I wonder what would happen…?”
Mr. Blue Sky took the words right out of my mouth. I still remember giggling like a maniac at a Bert and Ernie sketch where Ernie kept taking his nose off and sticking it all over the place. “Now my nose is on you, Bert!” followed by that Ernie laughter that I can’t for the life of me figure out how to spell.
We’ve got a 45 of “Rubber Ducky.” Envy me to your heart’s content.
