Sunday Afternoon With Fat Albert And The Gang

I just blew three hours watching Fat Albert cartoons on video. Ah, remember when fat kids were seen as funny and filled with wisdom beyond their years, and not an epidemic?

As pathetic as a thirty year-old sitting around watching three hours of kids cartoons sounds, I am not at all ashamed. Mostly, that is because I am generally shameless.

Leaving aside the Brown Hornet and Legal Eagle interludes (too preachy and goofy), the Fat Albert episodes were generally amusing. Except for the scared straight episode where Fat Albert and the gang get in trouble and are sent to prison to see how bad it is; a bunch of grasping, scary pedophiles say all kinds of inappropriate stuff to them.

In any event, watching the episodes made me nostalgic for my misspent youth, many hours spent hanging out with my cartoon friends. To be even more precise, I should replace "cartoon" with "only" in the previous sentence.

I used to really be into the Fat Albert jokes where someone in the gang was making fun of one of the other scrubs. The most common such joke ended in "Nooooo classsss."

For example:

"Russell: Rudy, man, you are like a weekend.

Rudy: How's that?

Russell: Nooo classss."

Or,

"Russell: Dumb Donald, you're like a summer vacation.

Dumb Donald: How's that?

Russell: Noooo classss."

Many of the jokes involved a similar pattern or using a metaphor to describe one of the gang, to hilarious ends.

"Bill: They oughta call you a tea kettle.

Russell: Tea kettle?

Bill: Yeah, cause you get everyone steamed."

Good, good stuff.