this is so bad!! what were they thinking about when they made these books?
Oh dear God. People read this to their children???*
*I mean "without irony", cause I'm totally not judging you for reading this to Juniper...because it's funny when you do it.
I haven't read her this one, but she saw me scanning the pages and wanted to know all about the dead bird.
I want to think that despite the pure terror from Faerie Tale Theater and duck-induced angst from Peter and the Wolf that I was tough kid but the dead bird and dead grandpa would have sent me into a TAILSPIN.
Awesome, they should do a 'Where are they now' series on Eric and see if he's still toting his dead Grandpa around with him.
If its not a true tale dont spoil my fantasy.
Explaining the death of a beloved grandpa doesn't get more touching than that, now does it?
I have no words.
Oh my god, I cannot take poor Eric's angst in the last picture! He is one step away from clutching at his hair and rending his garments! And those are some pretty nice garments too. Sweet striped pants, Eric. Don't rend those.
What on earth is this book called? Because I need to find one.
Spirograph! I forgot all about those!
another freakin' hilarious take...on our life and times and 'back-in-the-day'. thanks for the guffaw.
This book explains my brother.
you know, i had thought that you contributed some of the text to the past few installments of nixon's era childrens books. i did not realize these books are all real, without any humorous injection from you. i cannot believe it.
indeed: I haven't touched the text in any of them.
I am guilty of taking the most shocking pages and removing them from their context, which is a 1972 psychologist's idea of how children need to be educated about "uncomfortable" subjects.
Oh, Eric. Your mother killed Snow. She hated that bird. Called him "that damn rat with wings" when you weren't around.
She also had some problems with Grandpa, too. I'm just sayin'.
Oh, ick. I remember this book from my elementary school library. Emotionally scarring.
Eric sounds like a budding necrophiliac.
Eric Allen Poe?
Oh, my sweet Lord. That was frickin' HILARIOUS. My husband doesn't believe it's a real book. Can you prove it?
Did you get a boxed set of these? Where do you find all of them?
And have you thought about making one of your own, in the vein of some of your other tongue-in-cheek fictional children's oeuvres?
All you young whippersnappers that were so lucky to be raised during the 80's and 90's...this shit was pervasive in the 70's. WTH was wrong with people then? Every children's story back then seemed to involve death or just plain crazy shit like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
I remember being traumatized by some awful Christmas movie where the donkey died and my mom made fun of me for crying.
"Mommy said he would smell awful."
That really wasn't the helpful bit of guidance I was hoping Mommy would give.
Oh my. I thought the guy with a hook for a hand was terrifying, but this takes the freak out factor to a whole new level. Poor grandpa!
"The bird who didn't look both ways"! O I am dying. Laughing. "He was interested in dead animals." Oh the twisted pain! Get me a box! Bury me in Garanimals.
I don't think these books are bad. I think they are great. Reality, man. People can't handle reality. That's what's the matter with kids these days. Scared of hard, cold, reality.
Death especially.
Anyway, totally off the subject but I thought you might enjoy this. Pictures of abandoned places:
http://weburbanist.com/2008/09/2...andoned-places/
Oh sweet Jesus, this is the best one yet. If the bird stinks, just think about poor grandpa. The picture with the kids hanging out around the coffin is the wierdest.
No wonder all of us who were born during those times have so many issues. Our schools and parents scarred us for life with brutal reality.
I think Eric grew up to be Dexter...
These are still out there; there's an author who specializes in this stuff. I can't recall her name, but the titles are stuff like, "Mommy and Daddy are Breaking Up" and "My Uncle Drinks Too Much," etc. Always a laff riot.
I don't blame, Eric. That coffin would double as a badass train table.
I was actually with them up until the dead grandpa.
It's funny because my parents have a book from the same era with a similar tone that they read to my kids, but the subject matter is completely innocuous in comparison.
So to me, this is the equivalent of seeing a porno that Walt Disney made and quietly released just after Snow White.
that reminds me of a creepy twilight zone that i don't want to talk about. poor nixon-era children.
eric is such a goth!
We had a parrot who only liked my husband and he was flat out nasty to the rest of us. The kids and I used to brainstorm on how to get rid of him (oven baked Buzz, throw Buzz into Lake Michigan during a blizzard). After he took a hunk out of my daughter's nose I sold him. My Nixon era childhood rears it's ugly head again.
eric's striped pants are totally cool.
we have a contemporary book about pet death that is really great, if you like sobbing while you read the bedtime story. It's called Desser, the Best Ever Cat. Spoiler: Desser dies.
the bird STINKS?
this is awesomely funny.
How come the bird corpse gets a whole two page layout, and grandpa has to share his coffin shot with the two kids, on just one side of the book? Sucks to be grandpa.
Wow... Your collection of children's book really puts to shame my collection of vintage hygiene books.
got anything along those lines to teach kids about the harsh realities of STD's? Some like, "My Puppy Spot Can't Pee." These are hilarious btw.
Thanks
For a moment there I thought Mom was going to suggest taxidermy for the bird, which would have been even more horrifying considering the subsequent parallels with Grandpa.
oh my gosh! i have that book!! "about dying" right? that grandpa page always chokes me up.
Until the keeping grandpa bit, I was freaking out thinking: "Oh god, not again -- I am some screw-up who should've been raising kids in the Nixon era!"
We had a bird when I was that age. His name was Willy and he died. We yelled, "Dad! The bird's dead!" My father tried to shock his system by prying his beak apart and pouring bourbon down his throat. It did not bring Willy back. My father shook the booze-soaked dead bird at all of us yelling, "This is what happens when you don't feed the bird!" We were splattered with bourbon like those holy water shakers the priests use at Easter.
Oh my god. XDM's comment above is both the worst and best thing I have ever heard.
I have a feeling her dad could probably have sloshed just as much bourbon on them at that particular moment.
x could write a memoir about her family.
This book has startling similarities to the film (actual FILM) and accompanying booklets the girls were shown in my fifth grade class about the wonders (horrors) of menstruation.
That film and the above book share the same tone as the 'duck and cover' pamphlets that were used to illustrate proper safety techniques in case of tornado; vaguely menacing, obviously flawed, and somehow not quite sane.
And I still have no idea what purpose the little green plastic belt served in my very first box of feminine hygeine pads...
I just turned thirty this summer, by the way, so I was coming of age watching The Wonder Years not experiencing them.
Reminds me of "Blood on the Asphalt", a film they showed at Driver's Ed. We had been up all night the night before tripping on acid. Yikes!
disturbing...where do you find this stuff?
My grandpa managed a funeral home in the Detroit suburbs for over 50 years. My cousins and I all hung out there after school when we were young. Needless to say we were all very comfortable in the funeral home and have a twisted sense of humor. We found this book in one of the offices during a family member's funeral and could not stop giggling. Great book!
Oh my god. My parents gave us that book - I think this occurred when my grandparents started to get old and sick. I had completely forgotten its existence ...For some reason I particularly remember that woman's glasses as she held the dead bird ...
My mother actually had that particular series in her home daycare for many years. Parts of it may look disturbing, but I actually think it was a good way to teach children about death. I have a memory of something about wanting a red umbrella, because black umbrella's were scary and sad. It was an interesting series.
What the book doesn't tell you is that Eric will change his name to Kendall and move to Dutchess County and bury the prostitutes in his basement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Ken...endall_Francois
I too, thought you were creatively editing these books. And I would have been the right age to read them. I must have blocked them out.
Oh, dear Lord. Oh, holy crap. We had that book growing up. Looking at it now, I can't believe that book was ever present in my home.
What were my parents *thinking*?
i had this one! do you have the one about the hospital visit? it still creeps me out.
I don't remember this particular book, but I remember the *tone* of the era. It was all so rationally analyzed and dispensed. So ernest.
I really would like to know the dead bird book's title.
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