I don’t make watching Sesame Street a habit. That hasn’t happened since Kermit was a reporter and I first saw Mah-Na Mah-Na. (Fun Fact! From Wikipedia: ““Mah Nà Mah Nà” debuted as part of Umiliani’s soundtrack for the Italian mondo film Svezia, inferno e paradiso (Sweden: Heaven and Hell) (1968), a pseudo-documentary about wild sexual activity and other behavior in Sweden.” Started with wild Swedish sex and ended with the Muppets.) But every once in a while I will stumble across the ‘Street. I linger mostly to catch sight of Alan the owner of Mr. Hooper’s store. I worked with him in the past and my mom is his Facebook friend! Back in my stage management days, we did M Butterfly and Alan Muraoka was the Butterfly character. Spoiler! That character gets naked. Now who else can say they have seen someone from Sesame Street naked? But really, who would admit to that? (The title of this blog seemed so family friendly a few moments ago…)
Anyway, today on Sesame Street, Elmo was helping a seafoam green monster named Rosita to see a rainbow. They squeakily explained that “Roy G Biv” stood for the colors of the rainbow. (And I would be surprised if any kid picked up on what “i” stood for. Elmo’s voice and the word “indigo” are not a good match. But I guess kids are used to it. Kind of like how my ear is trained to understand heavy English accents.) Elmo conjured up some monsters to represent each color. They then started jumping about and screaming “Rainbow!” and talking over each other. Now I see where kids learn that behavior. (And for some, it stays with them into adulthood.) Finally, the mosh pit of monsters leaves and Abby Cadabby shows up and makes it rain. Because apparently, she doesn’t do magic very well. She also lost freckles on a previous snippet I saw. I don’t trust her.
Rosita and Elmo go into Mr. Hooper’s store to get dry. Alan and Gordon are hanging out. Which surprised me because Gordon is still alive. But he’s not the one I remember. Apparently there’s been a few Gordons. Kind of like Doctor Who, I guess. Well, this incarnation of Gordon is a science teacher and he shows Rosita, Elmo and Alan how to make a rainbow using science. Oh yes, I wrote down how.
You will need: a flashlight, a white piece of paper, a clear glass with water, masking tape.
- Put masking tape over flashlight
- Cut slit in tape so some light can shine through
- Put glass of water on a soup can or something (Oh! You need a soup can, too)
- Place sheet of paper next to soup can
- Turn off lights
- Shine flashlight through glass of water and onto sheet of paper
- Bam! Rainbow!
