# I've never figured out **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 8, 2020, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690 "2020-07-08T02:16:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2020, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/41 "2020-07-13T04:34:34Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > But in that light — of me finding it only by figuring you were off by a detail — let me toss in a possibility about the orphanage from that other post ?? Orphanage ?? I think maybe that was someone else? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2020, 9:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/42 "2020-07-13T09:09:18Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > ?? Orphanage ?? I think maybe that was someone else? Yeah, that one was for jayrey’s post. The answer to your question, I was pretty sure of; to theirs, a lot less. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2020, 10:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/43 "2020-07-13T10:04:18Z")
At that: [this](https://img.newspapers.com/img/thumbnail/477278300/400/400/0_1_3601_6592.jpg) looks plenty like a newspaper ad for Chuck E. Cheese’s crackers (listed just under the Cashews, listed in turn under the Salt Water Taffy). If that helps point elfkin477 in the right direction, I’ll be pleasantly surprised. ---
**Author:** ![mousetrap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bc8723/32.png) [@mousetrap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mousetrap)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2020, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/44 "2020-07-13T18:28:28Z")
> [@FlikTheBlue](#): > > I remember a set of cards from the late 80s that featured various monsters or mythological creatures. They were larger than regular playing cards, maybe about the size of a standard index card. One card in particular was a Will-o’-the-wisp, and IIRC there were something like 10-20 cards in the set. The front had an illustration and the back a short description. They were definitely not Magic the Gathering cards, as this would have been before even Alpha was released. Any ideas what I might be remembering? Those would be the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons monster cards, from back in 1982. See: [GROGNARDIA: Retrospective: Monster Cards](http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2009/05/retrospective-monster-cards.html) ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2020, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/45 "2020-07-13T18:31:46Z")
An article on point > **[Is sobriety an issue in the passenger seat?](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2004-jan-21-hy-wheels21-story.html)** > > State law is unclear as to whether a parent can be drunk while riding with a child who is learning how to drive. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2020, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/46 "2020-07-13T18:55:30Z")
Thanks!!! ---
**Author:** ![KMS94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ad7895/32.png) [@KMS94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KMS94)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2020, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/47 "2020-07-13T19:25:10Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > I’ve asked and read and have seen/heard varying opinions but I’ve never gotten a definitive cited answer. I did some searching through PA. law, and couldn’t see anything as clear cut and conclusive as our law in Maine. Up here, it is a criminal offense for which the parent could be arrested, but there are no consequences for the permittee. From the statutes: "A person commits a Class E crime if that person accompanies a permittee who is operating a vehicle on a public way and that accompanying person has impaired mental or physical functioning as a result of the use of intoxicating liquor or drugs. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2020, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/48 "2020-07-14T11:59:07Z")
Heh, it’s a really interesting (to me) area of the law. I first thought about it when my daughter was 16 and asked me to come driving with her. That was 14 years ago now. I’d had a few beers and thought about the situation. ---
**Author:** ![Author\_Balk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Author\_Balk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Author_Balk)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2020, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/49 "2020-07-14T21:39:04Z")
There was a song I learned. It was probably elementary school. Google doesn’t know anything about it, so it’s probably made up by the teacher, It’s something like… Do you want some raisins in your oatmeal? Raisins, raisins, raisins in your oatmeal. If you want some raisins in your oatmeal Then you better get up and get dressed. ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2020, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/50 "2020-07-14T23:40:47Z")
There’s an instrumental song, played on a saxophone or at least is very sax-heavy. I’m pretty sure it was the theme song for a talk show or infotainment type show in the late 1980s or early 1990s. I can hum it in my head, but since it’s an instrumental there are no lyrics to Google. And no, I’m definitely **not** thinking of the sax solo from “Baker Street” – I already checked. But it is similar in style. It’s also not the theme song from _LA Law_ (which isn’t the type of show I think it’s from, but someone on another board suggested it a while back). But I have no idea what it is. I know that’s really not much to go on, and sax-heavy theme songs were common in that era, but does anyone have any ideas? ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2020, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/51 "2020-07-14T23:44:06Z")
Benny Hill theme/Yakety Sax? [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/tNBL5OMeuno/hqdefault.jpg "Benny Hill - Yakety Sax") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNBL5OMeuno) ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2020, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/52 "2020-07-14T23:46:26Z")
Nope, not that. It was more “serious” for lack of a better word. And closer to smooth jazz in style. More like Kenny G’s style, although when I hear it in my head I hear an alto sax, not Kenny G’s soprano sax. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2020, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/53 "2020-07-15T01:30:57Z")
The sax theme from [Poirot](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mRo7tMnM60I)? ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2020, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/54 "2020-07-15T01:35:31Z")
No, not that either. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2020, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/55 "2020-07-15T01:40:08Z")
Serious or light hearted? Fast or slow? Smooth or choppy? Etc. ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2020, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/56 "2020-07-15T02:20:56Z")
Serious. Probably more slow than fast, but not _that_ slow. Smooth. Like I said before, I’d describe the style as smooth jazz. Part of me wonders if I’m just remembering some Kenny G song and mistakenly thinking it was a TV theme song. My mom did like to listen to Kenny G in the 1990s. But I don’t want to have to go listen to a bunch of Kenny G songs to figure it out. And I am pretty sure it was an alto sax rather than a soprano sax like he played. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2020, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/57 "2020-07-15T07:41:55Z")
Gonna read the thread in a bit, but I’ll give my white whales first. A couple stories I read as a kid in our readers, that clearly were excerpts from another story. One involved a guy who suddenly wound up in an alien zoo and had to defeat his ant-like alien overlords. Another has people fleeing the destruction of earth landing on a new planet where there is no dust in the sky, and the wood is as hard as metal–unless you split it lengthways. There’s an old Apple II game that I cannot find in the archives–really a whole set of disks, but one BASIC game in particular I wish to find. You drive a car along a road made up of \ | /, with 1,2,3. Unfortunately, the name of the game was DRIVER. And, finally, there’s this episode I watched on TV where this picked on nerd suddenly gets the “power” of everyone caring about everything he says. I specifically remember the scene where they start fighting over who can pick him for basketball in gym class (despite normally being last), and a girl he likes who never gave him the time of day showing up late at night at his doorstep in a robe, and dropping that robe–and then, as he takes her in, we see pretty much the entire town dressed in similar robes, clearly starting some cult. I thought it was an episode of _Painkiller Jane_, but I’ve never seen described. Pretty much every other thing from my past, I’ve found on Google. I found the _Noozles_, Flash Screen, the full Phantom Tollbooth, every NES game I ever played, the old version of Oregon Trail where you typed “BANG” to kill for food, etc. ---
**Author:** ![jerseymule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jerseymule/32/3155_2.png) [@jerseymule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jerseymule)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2020, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/58 "2020-07-16T08:22:44Z")
Sax heavy theme song from Mike Hammer: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/BTua5yI_jJo/hqdefault.jpg "Mike Hammer Theme Song") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTua5yI_jJo) ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2020, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/59 "2020-07-23T06:03:17Z")
Here’s something I never figured out. I was in a Berlin hotel room back in 2008 or 2009 flipping through the TV channels and on at least 2 of those channels there was a different topless woman taking phone calls from men and reading off what seemed like lotto numbers. A phone number and the string of “lotto” numbers were neatly superimposed beneath the breasts. I confess to watching a solid 30 minutes of this “entertainment” but even with a fairly good grasp of German, I couldn’t, and still can’t figure out what the deal was. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2020, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690/60 "2020-07-23T11:41:02Z")
[This collection](https://archive.org/details/LOGIC_AppleII_Disk-DOS027) has a game called “Auto Driver,” any chance that’s it? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ive-never-figured-out/914690.md?page=4)