December 8, 1999

Saturday morning: Cartoons and cereal

By GARRET LEIVA
Herald editor
       When you're a kid, most mornings are not your own. You're up at 7, eating breakfast by 7:30 and running to catch the bus by 8:20. It's a routine - including carrying your Marvel Super heroes lunch box - that gets old quickly.
      Then there are Saturday mornings.
      Saturdays meant no school; your time was your own. Somehow it never seemed difficult to crawl out from the covers before 7 a.m. - after all, the cartoons were on.
      Boobtube, idiot box; call it what you like, but for an 8-year-old kid television was king and the royal cartoon jesters of psychedelic bright colors and 'kersplat' sound effects were here to entertain well until high noon.
      Now the cynic might say that TV cartoons are merely vehicles for selling sugared cereals and expensive toys to impressionable youngsters. True as that may be, it hasn't disturbed the ongoing kids' ritual of staring at a tungsten tube for hours on a Saturday morning. Maybe kids watch because the programming imparts a sense of a happy world; maybe they watch because it's simply there.
      What ever the reason, my internal cartoon alarm clock would ring around 6:30 a.m. on Saturdays. Unlike during the school week, my footed pajamas would hastily slip-slide down the wood floor hallway; my feet spinning in place like Scooby-Doo going after an open bag of "Scooby snacks."
      Once in the living room, I'd thrown down a couch cushion and pull the TV set's "on" button. In a staccato burst hundreds of colored pixels came to life: Saturday was finally here.
      Before settling in for the long haul, however, I would fortify myself with a bowlful of 12 essential vitamins, including riboflavin, and a cup of 2 percent.
      My one Saturday morning let down was the lack of sugared cereals inhabiting our kitchen cupboards. Not even such noblemen as Captain Crunch, Count Chocula, or King Vitamin could set foot in the family grocery cart. Begrudgingly, I'd pour out the Corn Flakes, dump in four tablespoons of sugar and try to catch up with this week's adventures of Jonny, Hadji, Race Bannon and that mischievous Bandit.
      Jonny Quest was just one of many cartoon friends that came over to the house on Saturdays. Fred Flintstone, Hong Kong Phooey, Mr. Magoo, the Jetsons clan, Grape Ape, Underdog, Fat Albert, Spider-Man, Bugs Bunny, and the entire Justice League of America could all hang out in the living room.
      Admittedly, most of my cartoon watching was done in a sugar-induced-glass-eyed-slack-jaw mind-set : except for chuckling along with the laugh track. Even in my cartoon catatonic state, however, a few things made me scratch my bed-head hair.
      I wondered to myself whether Scooby and the Jetson's Astro were part of the same litter. Also, did no one, including scarf-wearing Daphne, have a change of clothes in the back of the Mystery Machine? What if both of the Wonder Twins used their activated power rings to form rings? And what was the deal with Freddie the flute and those lips?
      Cartoons did raise a fair amount of questions; both concerning the laws of physics and the morality of laughing when an anvil crushes Willie E. Coyote. Conversely, they did teach me to never order a pair of rocket-powered roller skates from a mail-order company bearing the name ACME.
      Looking back, Saturday mornings were indeed a special time. Which makes me worried for today's restless youth who have 24 hour access to cartoons and Pokemon the movie (or the latest flavor of the month that can fit in a fast-food kid's meal drive-thru bag). Who needs an internal cartoon alarm clock when you have the Cartoon Network.
      Perhaps I've grown overly sentimental about Saturday morning. In the process, I'm starting to sound like Mr. Wilson to the neighborhood Dennis the Menaces when they come over to the house and start flipping through the cable cartoon channels.
      It's funny, though, if you open the kitchen cupboard in my house on any given Saturday at 7 a.m. you'd undoubtedly find a box of sugared cereal. If you're looking for me, however, I'm the one hiding under the covers hitting the inner child snooze button.
      Grand Traverse Herald editor Garret Leiva can be reached at 933-1416 or e-mail at gleiva@gtherald.com.