E. M.’s Sunday Ramble No. 24, “Childhood Memories”

E. M. has another opportunity for me to find funny memes to go along with my answers to her questions. Here we go…

What is your first good memory from your childhood? I have a very clear memory of standing up (supporting myself on the couch) and seeing my parents talking. I might not have even been a year old. I think it was in the apartment we lived in at the south end of Magnolia Avenue (6400 block).

Name 3 things that you loved when you were just a youngster? TV (especially cartoons), reading, and having Dad tell me about the Pony Express.

What did you dislike, or even hate, when you were growing up? Any kind of condiments, and I’m no different today

If you could go give your younger self one piece of advice, what would you tell them? Save money. That way, if you need to get something fixed, you don’t have to depend on anyone giving it to you.

What kind of celebrations did you enjoy when you were little, and do you still like those celebrations now that you are grown? The celebrations that are associated with Christmas, New Year’s, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Columbus Day, Veterans’ Day, and Thanksgiving. I left out Labor Day because school started two days later. I still enjoy memories of them, though we aren’t big celebration people ourselves.

What commercial did you always wait for to come on television as a child? One that used to scare the hell out of me was one for a brand of windows called Solartherm. It was this cartoon of the devil that came flying at you screaming "SOLARTHERM!" I would scream whenever I saw it, so my parents would run to turn off the TV (this was in the olden days, so it meant they had to actually get up out of whatever chair they were in, run to the TV and shut it off) so I wouldn’t see the screaming image of Satan flying at me. They told me that they managed to shut off the TV once, and I screamed because they wouldn’t let me see it. I hope that one day someone will find it and post it to YouTube.

As for commercials I liked, one of them was for Funny Face drink mix. These drinks were like Kool-Aid, but were presweetened without sugar, meaning they were sweetened with saccharine, and they had interesting characters on the outside: Goofy Grape, Injun Orange, Rootin’ Tootin’ Raspberry, Freckle-Faced Strawberry, Chinese Cherry, and Loud-Mouth Lime. Within a year Injun Orange became Jolly Olly Orange and Chinese Cherry became Choo-Choo Cherry. The lead spokescartoon was Goofy Grape, who sounded a little like Frank Fontaine as Crazy Guggenheim.

That’s all for now!