eno2001's Journal: CHILDHOOD: Watching Meaningless TV in the 70s

Here's a bit of IM with a friend of mine in which I endlessly and randomly regale him with unwanted stories of my misspent childhood watching crap TV. I'm sure some of you relate:

(12:40:03) eno2001: Look! It's Pippi Longstocking! BEST STREET URCHIN EVAR!!!!!111!!!! Hehehe...
(12:40:24) Greebus: she looks crazy
(12:40:26) eno2001: My cousin loved the movies back in the 70s. I never really saw more than a few minutes of them.
(12:40:36) eno2001: Well she looked crazy as a kid too.
(12:40:59) eno2001: Kind of like a female Ron Howard:
http://shop1.impact-mailorder.de/catalog/images/Pippi-Langstrumpf.gif
(12:41:35) Greebus: man
(12:41:46) eno2001: http://www.educared.org.ar/imaginaria/12/2/PippiIngerNilsson.jpg
(12:42:01) eno2001: http://www.kindernetz.de/-/id=15256/property=detail/width=200/height=150/1mohqw8/index.jpg
(12:42:36) eno2001: Apparently the Pippi Longstocking movies shown here were just slapped together from the TV show in Sweden and dubbed.
(12:42:45) eno2001: Funny thing...
(12:43:04) eno2001: I've been capping the MST3K tapes I duped from this guy Ben the Ghost a few years ago.
(12:43:20) eno2001: He has all kinds of random crap on the tapes besides MST3K.
(12:44:00) eno2001: There was this one thing that I saw and it sent me all the way back to 1975 on the weekends in the Fall and Winter when I used to watch ANYTHING that was on the weekend movie on Channel 43 (WUAB in Cleveland Ohio).
(12:44:39) eno2001: I remember what used to happen was this. It would be a Saturday and it might be too cold to hang out outside.
(12:45:01) eno2001: We would have gotten the weekend errands out of the way like grocery shopping and my music lessons or what have you.
(12:45:05) eno2001: Lunch would be done as well.
(12:45:27) eno2001: So around 4:00PM or so, if I was home, I did this thing...
(12:45:53) eno2001: I'd turn on the TV to see if there was anything good on after Superhost (although I sometimes already had it on if Superhost showed something I liked).
(12:46:06) eno2001: Most of the time there wasn't anything good on.
(12:46:17) eno2001: If it was an old war movie or a western, I'd usually turn it off.
(12:46:39) eno2001: But, sometimes I was desperate for something to watch and I'd leave some pretty ridiculous crap on.
(12:46:49) eno2001: Usually I was tolerant of musicals.
(12:46:59) eno2001: But I wouldn't really concentrate on watching them.
(12:47:09) eno2001: I'd watch a few minutes, space out and get bored.
(12:47:22) eno2001: Then I'd go down in the basement and play with my chemistry set or the electronics stuff I had.
(12:47:37) eno2001: I'd do that until I got too cold to sit in the basement much longer.
(12:47:50) eno2001: Then I'd head back up, check the time and maybe watch some more of the dull movie.
(12:48:11) eno2001: Maybe I'd head up to my room then and play with some of my toys or read a book for a bit.
(12:48:32) Greebus has gone away in bordom at my blathering.
(12:48:39) eno2001: Then I'd go downstairs and check the TV again. Occasionally I'd get sucked into another segment of a show that would catch my interest.
(12:48:59) eno2001: I'd watch that for a bit. Then I'd head back down to the basement to work on more experiments.
(12:49:24) eno2001: This was all in the wait between 4:00PM and 6:00PM for... Star Trek. (and dinner in front of the TV).
(12:50:52) eno2001: So the other day while watching one of the tapes I capped, there was just such a musical on the tape. I'd never seen it but it gave me that identical feeling of being five and bored on the weekend but still watching anyway. Mezmerized. I even got mezmierized for a minute as I watched the cap.
(12:51:46) Greebus is no longer away.
(12:51:52) Greebus: god I hate that kind of feeling
(12:51:56) eno2001: I had no idea what it was but I offhandedly commented that it looked like a 60s production of a Dickens story. Then I suggested that it might be Oliver Twist. Turns out I was right. It was the musical "Oliver!"
(12:52:00) Greebus: but, I'm rarely bored anymore
(12:52:09) eno2001: Well it made me all nostalgic though.
(12:52:11) Greebus: not enough time to be bored
(12:52:19) eno2001: I didn't mind it, to me it was just the typical weekend.
(12:52:30) eno2001: I expect my daughter to feel the same way. I think a lot of kids do.
(12:53:01) Greebus: kids are bored a lot
(12:53:04) eno2001: But for some reason it's a comforting feeling looking back on it. I think the reason it's comforting is that it also reminds me of how little I had to do back then in terms of responsiblity.
(12:53:15) eno2001: And THAT is quite a relief to remember.
(12:53:22) Greebus: part of it is that they don't know how to keep themselves safe, so adults have to put them in situations where things are kind of dull
(12:53:34) eno2001: There's ALWAYS something to think about or work no now even during my "down times".
(12:54:32) Greebus: yeah... well, for example Mr. Greebus just called me a few minutes ago
(12:54:34) eno2001: I wonder though if maybe one of those weekends, one of those boring shows was actually Oliver! and that it was lodged deep in my head.
(12:54:37) Greebus: our dishwasher is leaking
(12:54:39) Greebus: great
(12:54:40) eno2001: Bah. That sucks. More crap to deal with.
(12:54:59) eno2001: Getting back to what I was saying... (as I blather on endlessly at you) I had a similar revelation over the summer.
(12:55:12) eno2001: I was on vacation painting the front steps on a warm sunny morning.
(12:55:22) eno2001: It was a Thursday or Friday I think.
(12:55:50) eno2001: These boys went riding by on their bikes having a "kid" argument about something being cooler than something else.
(12:56:08) eno2001: Again, I was sent back to Summer 1978-79.
(12:56:22) eno2001: I remember that last day of 4th grade at St. Ann's.
(12:56:27) eno2001: I walked home that day.
(12:56:39) eno2001: It was warm and school let out for the Summer around lunch time.
(12:57:27) eno2001: I was walking up Lee Rd. and ran into my buddy Joey. Edna (Mrs. eno2001) and I call him "Boss Joey" now because he was one of those kids back in the 70s who when he thought something was cool would say, "Man! That's really boss"!
(12:58:17) eno2001: So Edna and I use it to equate to stupid 70s kids, usually boys, who were really bad at schoolwork, liked REALLY stupid TV and basically grew up into today's Jackasses that run the world. But I digress... ;P
(12:58:29) Greebus: heh heh
(12:58:33) Greebus: ugh... gotta go do this stupid "greeter" thing now. BBL.
(12:58:35) eno2001: So I remember Joey and I got into an argument about something.
(12:58:37) eno2001: Yuck.
(12:58:42) eno2001: OK. Talk to you later.

Hmmm... comments not enabled due to CmdrTaco fucking around with teh Slashcode again...