Cheech and Chong have reunited and are going on tour. I was introduced to their albums by my babysitter, Sally, and it occurred to me that I never thanked her.I never had an older sibling to introduce me to important cultural milestones. I had to discover them on my own. For young Rider, there was no Zooey Deschanel leaning in close to tell me, "Someday, you'll be cool," and then handing me a suitcase full of rock albums to calibrate my compass.
Had he known, my old man would've been pissed to discover his 12-year-old was buying comedy albums celebrating drug use. He would've been even angrier to find freckle-faced Sally had been my comedy pusher.
I kept all that on the down low. I learned my lesson after he caught me walking in the door with Boston and began inspecting the track titles. ("'Hitch a Ride'...'Smokin''? You're not gonna do any of these things, are you?")*
Sally did her job well. I soon moved on to Richard Pryor and George Carlin and National Lampoon. (I occasionally slipped...spending money on Weird Al in a moment of weakness, for example.)
So here's my official thanks, Sally McLean. You may have dressed like a hippie, but you had two things that made up for it: you smelled better than a hippie and you had great taste in comedy.
* "Gaw, Dad, no! Jeez!"
5 comments:
For all the weed I smoked and comedy albums I listened to and comedy I watched.... I still don't think they're that funny.
Zibbs: If you didn't think they were funny you weren't smoking the right weed. At 12, though, I was more into the stuff I could relate to, like "Earache My Eye" or "Sister Mary Elephant."
Was the footnote supposed to imply Wiley Wiggins from "Dazed and Confused?" Because that's how I will probably picture Young Rider from now on.
"Young Rider, starring Wiley Wiggins" would make a great saturday morning show by the way.
McGone: I think Wiley would have to portray me in Rider: The College Years at this point. I would give him my blessing as long as he touched his forehead in frustration as often as he did in Dazed. Sample dialogue:
GRAPHICS PROFESSOR: Hold the pen straight up and down, Rider. You're leaving ink blobs at the intersections of your lines.
RIDER (pinching bridge of nose): GAW! I've done it three times already!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. This comment thread was even better than the post. Probably because I've seen Dazed and Confused approximately 74 times, so I know exactly what you guys are talking about.
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