Dick Summer Connection

So, predictably, my buddies are all giving me a hard time…’cause that’s what buddies do. My pal Al is calling me the Crayola Man…he says I’ve

stopped being realistic since I’ve been on my “cynics suck” kick. He claims that lately I have been reminding him of a little kid happily playing

with his crayons instead of paying attention to the fact that the world is about to end, our taxes are sure to go up, and radio as we know it is

dead because of ipods.

 

Well, let “Crayola Man” tell you a true story about Crayolas. As some of you know, I do television commercials. A few years ago, I won an audition

to do some commercials for Crayola crayons. I showed up at the studio, grabbed my cup of coffee, went into the booth, and I asked the producer

for the script. He said, just say Crayola Crayons a few times. I figured he was doing a sound check, so I said Crayola Crayons a few times…then I

said, ok guys where’s the script. He said, “that’s a wrap.” I said, what are you talking about. He said, “that’s it. We just needed a tag.” A tag is

what you call a very short statement at the end of a commercial. They put that tag on the end of five national commercials and ran it for three

years. It earned me almost six figures in residuals before they killed those spots. So I have fond feelings for Crayola crayons.

 

And besides that, I like the fact that crayons have a kid smell about them…like chalk has…and sliced apples and peanut butter. I liked being a kid.

And I’ve always liked apples, peanut butter and strawberry jam, oatmeal and raisins…and I have them every day now for breakfast AND lunch…

because I’m an adult and I can eat like a kid if I want.

 

I also like the feel and smell of crayons. They give them to kids to keep them quiet at Applebee’s…and when we go in there, I usually grab some

for myself. I tell the waiter it’s for “my little guys.” Which is not a lie…I sometimes call my fingers “my little guys,” because like most little guys

they get into trouble fairly regularly. It’s not my fault what they do while the guy who’s supposed to be in charge isn’t watching. They’re like my

eyebrows. I always wanted to say things to girls like the Big Bopper used to say…hellooo baaaybe. But I can’t get away with it, because the little

guy sitting in the back of my head who’s supposed to keep things under control always runs to see who I’m talking to when it’s a pretty girl, and

while he’s gone, my eyebrows flip up and down a couple of times, which makes my Lady Wonder Wench giggle…instead of looking at me

adoringly …like Bergman looked at Bogart in Casablanca. Same kind of thing happens with my fingers.

 

Crayolas are made in Pennsylvania, by the Binney Company. They make around 3 billion of them a year, so little kids all over the world can make

refrigerator art with them. That’s been going on since the 1930s. So you figure all of today’s big shots must have played with them when they

were kids. Bush, the Pope, the Ayatollah … even that nut case in Iran who’s name I can’t say…all of them did it. Can’t you just see them all…little

kids…sticking their tongues out…scribbling like mad… concentrating on their coloring books…then all running over to their mommies…happy

and excited about drawing a tree that you can kind of recognize.

 

Beats what they’re up to these days.

 

Maybe we should have a Crayola rocket. When things get tense, we’d launch it with a payload of millions of crayons…the thing would explode

high up in the air, and millions of crayon boxes would float down under little parachutes…and everybody would chuck their guns, run out and

grab some crayons, stick their tongues out and start scribbling.

 

Then while the bad guys are in kid mode, maybe we could deal with them like kids would do. We could take them out to play hide and seek and

then just sneak away. Especially that North Korean guy.

 

There was always one kid who was so good at hiding, nobody could find him…even after the game was over and all the other kids went home.

Johnny T was that kid in our neighborhood. He hid so well one day, nobody has seen him since the third grade. When it got to be the North

Korean guy’s turn to hide, we could just tip toe away and let him keep hiding for a few years.

 

Com’on…I know it’s childish. But give Crayola Man a little giggle. Giggles are good…except when caused by out of control eyebrows, or “little

 guys” that your girlfriend says are “too cold.”

 

Dick’s Details: (The answers are all in the current PodProgram at www.dicksummer.com

1- What do some Americans seem to do with the ton and a half of food they eat each year ?

2- What’s different about some politicians’ brains ?

3- What’s strange about 75% of American women’s bras ?

Scoring:

3 right – Brain surgeon.

2 right – Airline pilot.

1 right – Talk show host.

0 right – Disc jockey.

So, what have we learned ?

 

1- No matter how accurately you kick your dog, your wife won’t award you an extra point.

2- Guys cannot be held entirely responsible for their eye brows or their “little guy’s” actions when a pretty girl is around.

3- Realism is not the same thing as cynicism.

 

Would love to hear from you – Email – dick@dicksummer.com  – or just post a comment below. I read em all.

Know why guys try to be funny ? Two reasons: 1- It gives you bragging rights if you can be funnier than the other guy. 2- Laughs turn a girl on. Robin Williams could have so much sex he would be seriously injured by the friction. It figures. Sex is a funny looking thing. The biggest difference between “adult” porn and eroticism is good lighting, and a sense of humor. There is nothing funny about sex with children.

“Your looks are laughable, un-photographical, yet you’re my favorite work of art.”

Somebody once said that “If a woman lets a man look directly into her eyes for two whole minutes, she’ll be in his bed in an hour.” Eyes can be very sexy. My Lady Wonder Wench sometimes gives me a look that you could pour on a waffle. That shouldn’t be a surprise, because “erogenous zones” are either everywhere or they’re nowhere. And never forget the power of aural sex. Aural…words. (I’m told the other kind is good, too.) That’s not to say there isn’t a wee beastie about sex. If smarts, laughs and charm were all that’s going on between men and women, every guy in town would be chasing Barbara Walters.

We can talk about sex on tv now, as long as there are no laughs and the person talking sounds like he’s wearing a lab coat and a stethoscope. (And trousers.) I understand that stuff. But I figure that if “Erectile Dysfunction” gets bad, be sure to see your doctor just like they tell you. And if it gets worse, you should see a nurse. (Check first to be sure she’s a she.)

It was the venerable Bob Dole who made Viagra ok. I think the fact that none of us could imagine him actually using it was a help. It really was a breakthrough, though. Americans are completely hung up on sex. When I was at WPIX, the station was billed as “Love songs, nothing but love songs.” And the tv commercials featured little animated cupids. The station was flooded with complaints that the little animations were NAKED. Forces for good in the community were outraged. Fortunately, a giggle saved the day. The General Manager told everybody that if they could explain exactly what parts of the little animated cupids needed to be covered in order to preserve New York’s high standards of morality, decency and purity, he’d be glad to oblige. Nobody took him up on it.

I remember the first night I had a pantyhose commercial on my show at WNEW. When I saw the commercial on the log, I called the program director to be sure it wasn’t some kind of practical joke. He said “just do it…and no laughs.” See, that’s because laughs make things sexy. Which is exactly why Sister Mary Attila’s sternest command at St. Gregory’s all those years ago was…”NO LAUGHING.” She was Brooklyn’s first line of defense against sex.

“Is your figure less than Greek, is your mouth a little weak, when you open it to speak, are you smart ?”

I always liked smart girls. Except for Jeannie Campbell. I didn’t know if she was smart or not, and I really didn’t care. She was 5 and I was 6. She was struggling to learn which way the hat goes on the number 7. I knew that, but at that time I had no idea why it was so nice teaching her. I found out later, when I took her to my first high school dance. What a difference ten years made. I often wonder what ever happened to Jeannie. The way the Internet goes, maybe she’s reading this right now. Hey, Jeannie, drop a note to dick@dicksummer.com . It would be fun to see you again.

Some of the things that happen when you fall in love are more like bombs than exploding cigars. As I mentioned in the current PodProgram, a buddy of mine just told me his wife left him…after 20 years. Here’s part of his e-mail: “We’ve talked about how infidelity would forever change our relationship, and probably end it. But I swear if she came to me tonight and told me the truth, and said she’d rather be with me than with him, I’d suspend that stupid statement…I love her more than I love my beliefs about the perfect relationship. I want a life with her more than I want revenge for something that was probably, at least in part, my own fault.”

Then there’s a short news story that just grabbed me by the throat. I’m shaky on the details, because it went by so fast that I didn’t have time to take notes. It was on the BBC channel… and it was about a guy in Africa….it might have been Darfur. It seems a bunch of bad guys attacked a village and killed everybody there…except for one man. This guy had run off and made a successful escape…but his wife tripped and was killed…and he went back…he couldn’t leave her. They spared him because they figured he must be some kind of holy man. They couldn’t believe it. He had it made. They had no idea why he’d go back to face his own certain death.

They couldn’t understand that he just loved her…he wanted to hold her in his arms one more time…he needed to cry more than he needed to live…he simply didn’t care about living without her. Come to think about it, maybe that’s part of what “holy” is all about.

“Don’t change a hair for me, not if you care for me, stay little Valentine, stay.”

I’m looking at my Lady Wonder Wench…sitting on the couch across from me now…doing her needlepoint…and I understand.

“Each day is Valentine’s day.”

Dick’s Details Quiz – All the answers are in the current podcast on the website. ( www.dicksummer.com )

1- What’s the fastest way to be sure you have a cold snap on your hands?

2- What’s the evidence that we’re gaining on the termites?

3- What does Woody Allen claim he wants all his friends to say at his funeral ?

Scoring:

3 right – Two dozen Valentine’s Day roses.

2 right – A big Valentine’s day box of candy.

1 right- One grungy looking jelly bean.

0 right – Tickets to a Julio Iglesias concert.

So, what have we learned ? Love can be an exploding cigar. Or it can be a bomb. Some movie stars deal with that by getting married in the morning, so if things don’t work out, they haven’t ruined the whole day. Giggles can turn up the steam in sex. Hold somebody very special this Valentine’s Day. Go for it. Do it.