Romper Room Terror

The Friendly Giant is dead.

Bob Homme, who entertained generations of little kids with a few quiet minutes of wholesome television, passed away at 81 - a loss to Canada and children everywhere.

From what I understand, Mr. Homme was not acting when he put on those big boots. He was as gentle, loving and full of goodness as the wonderful character he portrayed. But let's face it, even The Friendly Giant, like most kids' shows, had a dark side.

I still, for the life of me, can't understand why such an obviously nice guy like Friendly would stick a rooster in a bag and hang it on the wall.

And not a word of complaint from the Humane Society or PETA.

But compared to the other kids shows of my youth, The Friendly Giant was mild. Take Mr. Dressup for example. Here's a guy who digs into something he calls "The Tickle Trunk", puts on weird costumes, and goes out in the backyard to dance and sing with a couple of puppets.

There's a role model for you.

But the absolutely most frightening show of my youth was Romper Room. That simple little program was responsible for one of the most horrific experiences of my life, which still sends reverberations through my adulthood, such as it is.

I don't know if you remember much about Romper Room, but there was always one part of the show when Miss Dorothy would grab some kind of magic hand mirror, stare into it and mutter a weird incantation like "Romper, stomper, bomper, boo", or something like that. Then she'd start rattling off kids names, like she could actually see them watching the TV.

At the point in my life when I was a Romper Room regular, I really hadn't figured out the physics behind television. So for me, this magic mirror stuff was certainly plausible. Frankly, somebody who believes that a big fat man comes down the chimney every Christmas or that it's OK to keep a rooster in a bag on the wall is likely to believe just about anything.

In my whole career of Romper Rooming, I had yet to hear Miss Dorothy mention my name. So when it actually happened, it took me completely by surprise.

"And I see Jimmy, and Johnny, and Sammy, and I see Bobby too," she said.

And there I was, in the middle of the livingroom, right in front of the TV, with an index finger firmly planted up my left nostril.

Miss Dorothy caught me picking my nose.

I was pretty upset. It was one thing to meet Miss Dorothy with your finger up your nose, but it was another thing entirely to get caught doing it by your parents. And although mine had not been around during the commission of my crime, I wasn't so sure Miss Dorothy would keep the incident to herself.

"Nah, not Miss Dorothy. She wouldn't tell. She's cool about kid stuff like that. She wouldn't fink on a kid picking his nose."

But Miss Dorothy was still an adult. And adults stick together.

So for the rest of the day, I went into sheer panic every time the phone rang or someone came to the door, sure that it was Miss Dorothy, or one of her minions, come to expose my nasal crime.

I hardly slept at all that night.

My reprieve came the next day, when I managed to gather enough courage to switch on Romper Room. Sure enough, it came time for the magic mirror.

I buried my face in my hands. "And I see Sandy, and Jessie, and Frank, and Sheila and Donny, and oh, there's Jackie."

I looked up.

No mention of me.

Or my nose.

I was safe. And I was free again to explore life's other mysteries, like why Mr Rogers entrusted his most precious parcels to an obvious whacko on a bike who tore around town yelling "Speedy Delivery".

Didn't he know about Federal Express?