Squiggled upon from a great height.
When I was a young tacker I developed a deep and enduring love for TV. I think it stemmed from the fact that the only tv I watched growing up in Africa was some "royal" people getting married - on the grainy b&w we all gathered round to watch it looked like some fit young girly about to be fed to this beaner with massive fucking ears.
There was also the weekly episode of "Skippy the Bush Kangaroo". As I knew we were moving to Australia soon I made sure I watched every episode I could. I was sure that by clicking my tongue in my mouth, I would be able to fluently converse with any of the kangaroos in Oz...

Then we moved. Mum bought a colour tv and video recorder. Oh, sweet opulence!
But it only got better. I discovered several shows that were to shape my mind and attitudes growing up. Monkey showed me that a fish and a pig are cool but being a hedonistic monkey is cooler. And also that to avoid trouble you should always listen to and obey your Buddhist priest. I also discovered that since I got up early on weekends there was something a lot more entertaining to watch than the test pattern. Thanks, rage!

But the jewel in the crown was
Mr Squiggle.



Here was a puppet with a pencil for a nose who could take the most esoteric bunch of scribbles on a page and not only make sense of it but turn it into a work of art. UPSIDE FUCKING DOWN!!
There were a few others that played a part in Mr Squiggle's world - Old bill and Gus the snail shared a joke and showed us more of the world, Blackboard was always a grumpy cunt. But if you watched him awhile you came to understand that his arrogance and frustration were simply a foil for Mr Squiggles breathy optimism. And of course little did I realise it then, at my tender age, but Miss Jane was not only an excellent upside-down-picture-turner-over but also a stone fucking cold fox.

Then, joy of joys I found out that Mr Squiggle was hitting the road. There was to be a live show at the entertainment centre of my town! Man, I pestered my mum day and night, I even offered to put in some of my hard earned pocket money. Eventually she capitulated and bought tickets - I was going to see my heros.
The deal was that you could bring along a scribble on a large piece of card and if you were lucky enough The Squiggle-Meister would deign to turn your pointless doodling into artwork right there in front of your eyes. On the day I sized up the competition. There were some contenders, but I felt that my piece entitled "Motivation: The antipathy of antithesis", a work I felt encompassed the very existential nature of the universe would trump them all.

The show was fucking amazing.
Finally as I expected I was chosen to bare my soul with my art. I took my piece up and it was placed upon the easel. Squiggle looked at it ponderously for a moment and then went rapidly to work. In seconds he was done. An oblong inside an oblong.
"There you are young man," he said "A Bear in it's Lair on it's side."
I started to protest but was (not so gently) ushered off the stage into the wings. That fucking useless hack had turned what was supposed to the equivalent of a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis into a blob and a bad play on words!

I would like to say I got my own back on Mr Fucking Squiggle - but the universe has another purpose for me, clearly. Having said that it hasn't stopped me wanking myself stupid imagining encounters with Miss Jane.
And Bill the Steam-shovel.
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 6:55, 16 replies)

"the very existential nature of the universe"
You don't know what "existential" means, do you?
(Star Wars Starwarsy McStarwars Face, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 9:06, closed)

Surely if I have to
argue with you about it, doesn't that negate your query?
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 9:24, closed)

No.
It's not a query: it's a rhetorical question, dressing up the assertion that you don't know what "existential" means. Your response indicates that (a) you don't understand how rhetoric works either, and (b) even if my comment had been a genuine query, you wouldn't have understood it.

Well done.
(Star Wars Starwarsy McStarwars Face, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 9:43, closed)

Deep.
Bro.

Deep.
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 9:47, closed)

You're not very bright, are you?
(Hint: that's another rhetorical question.)
(Star Wars Starwarsy McStarwars Face, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 10:09, closed)

You
on the other hand seem to be a veritable font of cleverness.

I envy that.
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 16:14, closed)

Ah Viz, Mr. Logic, he's a twat.

( d.r._and_quinch when will you be famous?, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 9:48, closed)

I could hug you.
Seriously.

But then again...
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 9:53, closed)

I'm not familiar with him.
Either way, it's so unlike Ringo to bring out the twat in people.
(Star Wars Starwarsy McStarwars Face, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 10:08, closed)

Not looking autistic.
At all.

That fedora suits you by the way.
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 19:24, closed)

Word salad.
(Bum Bag Fashion Boy Burned a home made pizza on, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 12:32, closed)

I see Mr Squiggle was big in the 1950's.
Still claiming to be in your thirties?
( Albert Marshmallow is a completely irredeemable cunt, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 16:35, closed)

40's actually.
Umm. Ended in 1999. It's there in the link that you clearly clicked on to look for something snide and pointless to say.

I'm not really saying you're thick or anything.
Maybe just "observationally challenged". Yeah?

EDIT: Pssst. - No. of seasons 41 & Mr. Squiggle was Australia's longest-running children's television series
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 18:10, closed)

I reckon you'll be 56 at your next birthday.
Sweepstake anyone?
( Albert Marshmallow is a completely irredeemable cunt, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 18:19, closed)

Surely your
financial advisor has warned you off the not so lucrative profit margins involved in gambling?
(s0ckpuppet logging out to reply to you if you're not careful, Wed 11 Dec 2013, 19:26, closed)

Is Albert Marshmallow
now allowed to mock other confabulating users? Fuck me, that must be a new low even in the life of Ian Belltone.
(SlantedScience, Thu 12 Dec 2013, 3:43, closed)