i watched Sesame Street today. yer damn right i did. i was going to put on Pollock, but i always have PBS on because it just fucking rocks. anyway, so Sesame Street was on.
and i’m convinced that whatever crazed, stoned (or straight up drug-addled) freaks created the show are obviously still up to their old tricks. i tell you, i almost went mad just watching it. allow me to describe:
four crazed monsters, all jumpin around and jibber-jabberin’, yappin’ and flappin’ their furry mouths like a bunch of speed freaks at Disneyland… suddenly, out of the floor springs a giant fucking burrito. let me say that again. a giant fucking burrito springs out of the floor. they rhapsodize about the goddamn thing for a few minutes, then devour it, foam faux cheese and lettuce and beans and meat flying every which way in the process. within ten seconds it was gone. then, one of them (of the same monster race as Telly) suddenly proclaims that it is now time to be chased by an elephant. let me say that again. it is now time to be chased by an elephant. the elephant throws open the door and, in a rather regal voice, declares that for a change of pace, he’s brought a chicken with him, so that he can be chased as well. let me say that again. he’s brought a chicken with him, so that he can also be chased. at this point, what ensues can only be described as complete and utter madness, as a cacophany of shrieking monsters, an elephant, and a chicken proceed to chase each other around this little straw shack for about 2 minutes, arms and legs (and trunk and comb) flying everywhere during the chaos.
then the elephant leaves and the chicken stays behind (naturally)… immediately one of the hairy screaming freaks shrieks that it’s nap time. every one of them (including the chicken) suddenly drops to the floor in a big pile of colorful furry limbs. a clock, offscreen, ticks. after about 4 seconds, a short alarm rings, and they all pop up, as if nothing incredibly odd had happened. they’d just taken their afternoon nap, that’s all.
next scene: The Count. he plays his pipe organ after a minute or two of furtively warming up, start-and-stop like. the first pipe screams “ONE!” (the Count is hoping to see what the Number of the Day is, apparently, and hence is playing notes until Something Happens.) then he plays the next note, a half step up. it of course screams “TWO!” and suddenly a violent party breaks out like a mariachi band being set on fire and shot out of a cannon. it would seem that the number two is in fact the celebrated digit du jour. SOOOO… what else to do but reward the viewer, simply for witnessing this bizarre display, by announcing that two tubas in tutus will now do a dance as a sort of tribal celebratory show in honor of the Magic Number? let me say that again. two tubas in tutus dance for the benefit of the stunned audience.
have you ever laughed so hard that no sound came out, that your entire consciousness was filled with such strange and tortured mirth that it was instantly clear that you had indeed suddenly gone temporarily, but no less drastically, insane? yup, that was me.
