The home of that obscenely large bird, an angry trash can dweller, a vampire and a man named Gordon turned 40 years old this week. While the characters of Sesame Street were very well known to me during childhood, I don't remember ever watching the show except for one time where I found it boring and soon changed the channel. Among my toys was an Oscar the Grouch hand puppet sans a garbage can and a Sesame Street playset that we used with the Fisher Price people and the GI Joe's. Oh, I forgot, I met the guy who plays Gordon once at Hamilton Place Mall and even shook his hand. He was there putting on a show, minus the characters of Sesame Street.
My childhood was not without puppet/human interaction. Nickolodeon provided hours of human-puppet dialogue via Pinwheel. It would seem this was a poor man's Sesame Street, but seeing how it was on a cable channel while Sesame Street aired on Public Access, the analogy doesn't quite fit. Pinwheel had the characters Plus and Minus who were similar to the famous Bert and Ernie. A crabby green creature known as Ebeneezer seemed to be the lead puppet. Instead of a big shag carpet looking creature seen only by Big Bird, Pinwheel had a weird hooting bird in an admiral's hat that eluded Ebenezer's repeated attempts at photographing it. As far as humans go, there was a man named Jake and I believe a clown/mime named Coco. In all the years of watching this show, I can honestly say it taught me nothing. The "I Know My Name is Simon" cartoon would air on there and there was another cartoon about a bald headed kid named Bod. With these two cartoons, there were countless other skits and cartoons, but none that I remember or are even worth mentioning.
There was one cartoon however that would see that Jim Henson's wonderful creations found a path into my world of entertainment. Jim Henson's Muppet Babies aired on Saturday mornings and eventually weekday afternoons and I was a regular viewer. The Muppet Babies were one of my favorite cartoons. The Muppet Show itself was a shade before my time, but the Muppet Babies were on the scene during the time that cartoons were among my primary medium of entertainment. I loved this show.
Despite being around as long as it has, the characters of Sesame Street have only made it to the big screen twice. The first visit was the one I remember fondly. Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird is a childhood movie I enjoyed very much back in the day. It had humor along with some sad parts too. It also had a country singer I would come to very much admire later in life. The truck driver who picks up Big Bird and breaks out in song was none other than Waylon Jennings. His "There Ain't No Mountain You Can't Climb" was a very catchy tune that I still remember a few lines from today.
My brother did make a humorous joke out of Sesame Street once. He said, imagine a little boy running to his mom, so proud that he can count to ten. He says, "Mommy, I can count to ten, wanna hear me?" As he shares his new found knowledge with his mom he says, "One, ah ah ah ah ahhhh, two, ah ah ah ah ah ahhhhh, three, ah ah ah ah ah ahhhhhhh...." In case you don't get the joke, you have visited that fictional place where puppets and humans coexist even less than I have.
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