ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, January 29, 1996 TAG: 9601300011
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Ben Beagle
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE
Something is wrong deep in the American psyche.
That is to say (a little of that spooky organ music from ``Phantom of the Opera," please) that something has happened to Cracker Jacks.
Which is kind of like finding out that something has happened to motherhood or that John Wayne played with dolls.
Doesn't have a thing to do with the way they taste. That sugary stuff still gets all over your new $500 crown, and you have to brush your teeth in the middle of the day.
Same old Cracker Jacks. Except this box we bought recently didn't have any nice little toys in it.
It had these paste-on things that you attach to the face of this little animal - I don't know what it is - and thus you change its expression.
I don't mind telling the Cracker Jack people that when I was a boy, I expected to find something a little more substantial, if less challenging, than that in the box.
This substitution for a toy is called "Animaniacs Sticker Madness." It should be obvious that this doesn't give you the same kind of kick as finding a little tin whistle.
It's possible, I suppose, that the Cracker Jack people are trying to unlock the intellectual potential in our children. I'm not against intellect, but I say give me a nice tin whistle any day.
I think children deserve to look into a Cracker Jack box and find a little saxophone or something they can put on a bathtub chain and wear around their necks.
And I think many of them would take those stickers and glue them on the refrigerator next to their orthodontist's appointment - or on the arms of your new $1,500 sofa.
I'm sorry to seem so set in my ways, but I come from a childhood of great surprises. For example, you bought a penny jawbreaker and you slurped and chomped it down and if it had a black center the guy who ran the store had to give you, absolutely free, a brand new yo-yo.
Winning a yo-yo like that was prestige in the 200 block of Arch Street. Even the little blond girl who had real lace-up roller skates noticed stuff like that.
This 10-year-old va-va-voom type would have turned up her lovely snub nose at a bunch of animal stickers.
You laughed a while back when I told you that civilization as we knew it was ending when they stopped giving Green Stamps at the grocery store and gas station.
As far as I can tell, it probably did.
LENGTH: Medium: 54 linesby CNB