Luckily, he's not the target audience.
November 14, 2004My parents took Henry for the weekend, bless their grandparently hearts. Today I got to hear my dad expressing his utter disdain for Noggin. You might have to know my father to be amused by the idea of him watching a channel for preschoolers. My dad is a certified smart guy, an MIT grad who reads probably 37 books a day (I exaggerate, but only a little), a man blessed with the intellect of, say, a Lewis Lapham, but without the liver-spotted cranium. The charm of a Walter Cronkite, but with a sliver less good-Lord-is-he-still-alive-ness. The hair of a Phil Donahue, only less so. So anyway. Here he is in our living room, fresh from a Noggin-packed morning with Henry.
Dad: I can’t watch it for more than five seconds without screaming.
Me: What were you watching, exactly?
Dad: [grimacing] Some kind of “big, bigger, biggest” puzzle. Involving a cow.
Me: You realize these puzzles aren’t meant for you?
Dad: And then there was a Spanish-speaking girl.
Me: That would be Dora.
Dad: And her nitwit monkey. He wore boots.
Me: That would be Boots.
Dad: [frowning] And Boots loses his lunchbox by throwing it off a bridge. He’s such a mindless dope that this monkey swings his box around and WAAAIOO there goes his lunchbox!
Me: You really took this personally.
Dad: And then Dora fishes it out with a reel, like that would work. Even if the fishhook could grab the lunchbox, like it wouldn’t tip over and its contents would not simply fall out into the water…
Me: Wow.
Dad: [Shaking his head and downing the rest of his scotch] I tried explaining this to Henry but I don't think he was listening.
Reader Comments (28)
Either MIT has some sort of B.S. degree in the Grumpy Sciences, or Henry and Robert are cousins.
fortunately he's outgrown the worst of it now. i can get behind the magic schoolbus without hesitation: try some of that out on your dad. henry might like it too! much less annoying and it's fun to hear kids talk about how pickles are made, for example.
But oh dear. I'm one of the grumps. I cannot handle any children's television, videos, etc. Then to entertain her, I make up my own annoying programs. (We even have puppets...) And I annoy myself. The stupid songs I make up get stuck in my head. But at least my home grown children's entertainment cannot be used later to sell anything to her. So unless she's permanently scarred by having her toy butterfly machine-gun her toy ape to death all is good.
I actually kinda like most of what my kids watch. We TiVo mostly Disney Channel stuff (Wiggles, Stanley, etc) but Saturdays turn into a Noggin marathon. I found myself stuck watching "Miffy" the other day...
Can...Feel...Brain...Cells...Dying...!
I found it helpful to imagine that all the little bunnies and bears are telepathic, since nobody moves their mouths.
That photo of Henry is perfect. Gawd, he's wonderful.
My 2 year old daughter brought my husband an Amelia Bedelia book to read the other day. She's too young to really understand it, but he read it to her anyway. Halfway through I heard him say, "This is stupid!" I was like, "That's the point. She is stupid, and kids think that's funny." Men and their analytical minds.
Related: some friends of mine got John an alarm clock that looks EXACTLY like Miffy, but it plays some weird little tune and shouts some Asian language.
Give your dad more scotch and have him watch them more often. He'll come around. It worked for my hubby (just kidding).
2. The Miffy theme song. It is viral. It runs with modified lyrics in my head almost constantly as such:
"Miiiffy, cute little bunnyMiiiffy, better have my money"
Over and over like that.