Our Neighborhood He-Man-Woman-Haters Club

When I was a little boy, my brother Paul and I usually spent our indoor time watching channel 50 out of Detroit. They had all the great re-run shows of the day:

• Lost In Space
• Star Trek
• The Adams Family
• The Munsters
• Superman
• Batman
  

They also showed all the Three Stooges, Little Rascals (Our Gang), and Laurel & Hardy vignettes.

There was one episode of the Little Rascals that I will always remember. It was about the "He-Man Woman Haters Club”. Spanky, Alfalfa, and Buckwheat make a club under the pact that they will never hang around with girls.

Of course Darla comes along and … oh here, watch the YouTube episode for yourself:



Why does this come to my mind?

Let me explain.

In our new neighborhood, across the street from our house is the corner of another street. From our big cathedral window you cannot help but look down this street. On the corner of that street sits a house.

The garage of that house is the "clubhouse" of our neighborhood’s “He-Man-Woman-Haters Club”.

Every day, sitting in that driveway, are four to six guys from the neighborhood. They are standing, leaning, or sitting on overturned plastic buckets. They are drinking beer and discussing whatever the agenda of the club is that day.

Ok, I admit that I have not yet gone over there, and I do not know what they are talking about. And it is I who have proclaimed them to be the “He-Man-Woman-Haters” club.

Why does this group bring to mind that Our Gang episode?

• I am assuming all these guys are married. (I know that sounds like enough of a reason already, but please let me continue).
  

• It does not appear that these guys rush back to their homes after a hard days work.
  

• I cannot imagine that their wives are fond of their husband's association. I would hazard to guess that this is the attraction of their club.

Hmm...

A bunch of guys sitting around a garage door, telling the type of jokes they would otherwise have to lean over and whisper to tell. Drinking beer and giving each other a hard time.

What a great kind of club.

I better grab my pail and a beer and get over there before they start talking about me!

You Tubin? Me Too.

Today the girls and I are sick and staying home. It’s the messy kind of sick that makes you sick to see it. They need some cheering up.

So the girls are home from school, and I am home from work. Well, kind of home, I am really supposed to be logged into the office taking care of a couple of things today. I am hoping writing this post helps get the blood moving.

Every Monday morning, I check out Pat Caputo’s blog on his site (see link on the left sidebar). Today he points us to one of these ultimate fighting bouts – featuring the debut of a former Detroit Lion 1^st round draft pick in 1994 – Johnnie Morton. Another great player the Lions smothered all the greatness out of.

Johnnie was not so great in this fight. He got knocked out like a guy blindly walking into a wrecking ball.

But afterwards, I did some looking around on You-Tube. I would be what one might call, a You-Tube Newbie.

I spent well over an hour surfing TV. Literally. I started with the fight, which took me to Steve Martin (Morton to Martin), and watched Wild and Crazy Guy stuff , then found old Rowen and Martin Laugh-In skits, then Smothers Brothers clips. Steve Martin used to write for them.

It was great.

But I couldn’t lay on my couch and watch – which in this condition was very desirable. Instead I sat here at my home office desk watching my 19” flat screen monitor – faded and streamed in not-so-clear format. But it was hilarious just the same.

Will this take over from conventional TV? That is the prediction.

But the link of the couch and the potato still has to be made. The lazy person flopped on the couch effortlessly watching … what ever is on.

The missing link is the "Lazy". Take away the Lazy, and you lose the potato. Take away the potato, and you lose the couch.

The PC I have at home does have a TV card in it, Windows Media Centre, remote control and hooked into our 42” (non HD) TV. But you have to really work if your not watching TV or a DVD or listening to music. You-Tube is not remote-control-friendly.

And if you can’t use your remote – then it’s not couch friendly.

Yes, I have a wireless mouse and keyboard. But has anyone ever really enjoyed sitting on a couch with a keyboard typing into a TV 10 feet away?

It just seems like work. Not good old fashioned couch-time.

So will You-Tube take over from TV? Not yet. Not yet in my house.

But it certainly will take away from the TV. The audiences are now significantly lower for the big three networks. Cable and the Internet are interfering with their god-given-corporate-monopolistic rights to at least 33% of the viewing audience.

I have moved a bunch of our old VHS home movies now to DVD. Why? So we can watch them on TV. All together. All sitting together and focusing on the same thing.

Get everybody in your house together right now. When they are with you here, click the play button. This is Ashley and Alannah’s favorite video right now. While you watch it – imagine my 4 and 6 year olds dancing all crazy:

Everybody enjoyed it right? But I bet you all wished it would have been on the TV.

But maybe I just bridged the generation gap?