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Friday, December 12, 2008

May Your Days Be Merry And Bright

Posted by Adam Roberts on 12/12/08 at 05:03 PM

And here, at last, is your obligatory Valve Christmas post. Well, sort of. Earlier today, discussing Christmas songs with my daughter, I revealed I knew all the words to ‘White Christmas’. When pressed as to how I knew this (whether, for instance, I had specifically memorised the lyrics) I made the following, and in retrospect perhaps rather embarrassing, confession.

When I was younger, way back down in the nineteen seventies, I loved the Goodies. I loved them so much I not only watched the shows but owned the Goodies book ... this one, in fact, a spin-off piece of merchandising. It was filled with jokes which, in my childish enthusiasm, I read over and over again whether or not I understood them. Sometimes I sought explanations for things that my ten-year-old-self recognised to be jokes without understanding how or why, occasioning this sort of exchange:

ME: Dad?
FATHER: Yes?
ME: See, in my Goodies book here, it says “name: Goodies; address: No Fixed Abode, near Cricklewood”?
FATHER: Yes?
ME: That’s a joke?
FATHER: What?
ME: “No Fixed Abode, near Cricklewood”?
FATHER: Yes I suppose so.
ME: Why?
FATHER: (evasively) Well, it’s sort of ... it’s a little hard to ... hmm.

Anyway, one of the gags in this book was hung on the slender premise of the Goodies ringing up Bing Crosby and asking, despite a poor and crackly transatlantic connection, who he was inviting to his Christmas party. This was all written down, as if Crosby had dictated the list of names over the phone, and even at ten years old I could (a) see that this was a gag, and understand it as a gag, and indeed find it very funny, and (b) memorise the list of names. I assume, looking back, I had nothing better to do. Indeed, I know that I didn’t, apart that is from reading Asimov novels, watching telly and lolling about. The upshot is that now whenever anybody so much as mentions the song ‘White Christmas’ I instantly picture, as if projected upon the eidetic screen of memory, the following:

Emma Dreaming
Arthur White
Chris Muss
Jess Likedee
Juan Swee
Hugh Sterno
Wendy Treetops-Glisn
Anne Children
Liz-Anne
‘Two Ears’ Laybell
Cindy Snow

My word upon it: I long ago lost the Goodies book; that list came spontaneously from my little grey cells, and from nowhere else. And it is by recalling that list that I know the lyrics to White Christmas, god help me. I mean, if I could purge the portions of my brain given over to memorising wholly pointless junk and put them to some useful purpose, I’d be a mentat. Ah well. I’d still, decades later, argue that the very idea that somebody could be called ‘Two Ears’ Laybell is, in itself, a priori funnier than anything I have ever written. So perhaps it’s worthwhile. I give the last words to his honour, the mayor.

Mayor Daisby
Mary-Ann Bright
Ann May Alleor
Chris Muss
S.B.Bright.

Comments

That is indeed brilliant; but what, if anything, did your younger self make of the fact that Mr/Ms Muss made the list twice?

By Dave Maier on 12/12/08 at 08:33 PM | Permanent link to this comment

I can’t remember, although looking at it now I’d assume it’s Christopher and Christiana Muss. The question then is, why not list them together? Why separate them like that?

By Adam Roberts on 12/13/08 at 04:31 AM | Permanent link to this comment

Great stuff, Adam, I loved ‘The Goodies’, too - remember ‘Kitten Kong’?

Couldn’t resist a go myself:

Ava Self
A. Mary Liddle
Kris Muslet
Uri Hart
Bea Lite
Frome Nowon
R. Trubbles
Will. B. Otto-Zeit ...

(I know all the names of the ‘Trumpton Fire Brigade’, too - signs of a misspent yoof?)

By on 12/15/08 at 10:42 PM | Permanent link to this comment

Why do you never respond to my posts, Adam - something I said?

By on 12/20/08 at 11:47 PM | Permanent link to this comment

Sorry! Nothing personal ...

By Adam Roberts on 12/21/08 at 09:39 AM | Permanent link to this comment

I also used to have the book, and still remember most of those White Christmas “lyrics” many years on. In fact, I think you have the last two lines wrong, I recall something like:

Anna-May Hall-York-Rhys
Mrs B. White

Particularly amusing was a photograph of Bing Crosby (he of rather prominent ears) subtitled “Two-ears Laybell?”.

By on 12/28/08 at 03:09 PM | Permanent link to this comment

Nial, I believe you’re right.

By Adam Roberts on 12/30/08 at 08:29 AM | Permanent link to this comment

I also loved the Goodies. I had the book too. I don’t know where it is anymore.

By parrot cages on 07/22/09 at 09:44 AM | Permanent link to this comment

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Friday, December 12, 2008

May Your Days Be Merry And Bright

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