Category archive: tv

November 20, 2009

On Not Quite Grasping The Concept

K2 just came running into the room. "Mommy come help! Wow Wubzy stuck in car!"...
[read the full post...]

November 14, 2009

Heh, Baby Weinstein

I was just building bookcases, listening to WNYC's weekly radio show, On The Media, minding my own business. Then this bit on Disney's Baby Einstein refund story came on, and I laughed so much, I could no longer operate...
[read the full post...]

November 13, 2009

DT Friday Freakout: Home Alone Edition

While the whole family's scattered to various grandparents for the week/night, I'm freaking out about how well the lacquer on the new radiator cover will take the heat. For you, how about some hyperbolic science and parenting headlines to freak...
[read the full post...]

November 10, 2009

Health Care Reform Prop Baby

Well change my mind and open my health care savings account! Now that 7-month-old Maddie has successfully channeled her opposition to health care reform through her zombie symbiant Rep. John Shadegg, I am thoroughly opposed to upsetting the insurance...
[read the full post...]

November 8, 2009

As Finally Seen On TV

"I just saw the bestest thing ever on TV, and it's only $19.95!" When the kid comes bouncing in to tell me this, barely able to control her excitement, a lot of thoughts pile up in my mind: we certainly...
[read the full post...]

October 30, 2009

Japanese Rainbow Elmo's Super, Thanks For Asking!

Sanrio introduced these rainbow Elmo cell phone straps last year in Japan, as if the only problem with Elmo is that he's red. Elmo Dreams in Rainbow Colors cell phone straps [muppet wiki via Mr Brian Design]...
[read the full post...]

October 29, 2009

Ex Thinkgeek, Star Trek Baby Nerdia

Stardate 63293.1 We have come across Star Trek Onesies at Thinkgeek, which show signs that the Gerber Childrenswear Company has apparently abandoned its claim on the Onesie copyright on this M-Class planet. The Starfleet Academy cadet Onesie shows the...
[read the full post...]

October 23, 2009

Sesame Street Fight! SW Calls BS On AA T's PR

Haha, you know how a couple of weeks ago, everyone was scratching their heads and going, "Really?? Sesame Workshop approached American Apparel for a Sesame Street throwback T-shirt licensing deal?? Can you guess which one just doesn't belong here?" I...
[read the full post...]

October 20, 2009

Moose And Zee, Can I Talk To You Outside For A Minute?

OK, I'm still trying to grapple with the fact that Noggin is now officially nick jr. So I'm not ready for the kid--who's home sick again with a fever, but who is NOT watching TV--to wander up and ask to...
[read the full post...]

October 16, 2009

And A Sky Tumbled By, With A Private Balloon For Falcon

Now I missed the Balloon Boy family's appearance on Larry King to explain how the whole thing--was just because the parents are freaking insane narcissists. Fortunately, a commenter on The Awl basically liveblogged the hilari-sad tale of how Falcon couldn't...
[read the full post...]

October 15, 2009

The Spike Jonze Maurice Sendak Movie I DEFINITELY Want To See

Wow, but the documentary Spike Jonze and Lance Bangs about Maurice Sendak sounds absolutely fantastic. Sounds like their hang-back style captures this cantankerous, complicated, sad, angry, sensitive old genius almost perfectly. As one commenter on the LA Times piece says,...
[read the full post...]

October 9, 2009

That'd Be The Wong-Baker FACES Pain Scale, Colbert

"His show is like the dramatization of a pain chart on a pediatrician's wall."- Stephen Colbert not giving Dr Donna Wong or Dr Carol Beck the credit they deserve while talking about Glenn Beck [who once advertised his special...
[read the full post...]

HAHA, Gap Casting Call Turning Into Mall Mom Version Of Survivor

Given that they're all wearing all the same clothes from the same two stores, you'd think I'd have an easier time recognizing This Country Of Mine, America. A post about the Gap Casting Call on the popblog Bumpershine has become...
[read the full post...]

October 7, 2009

Bend Over For The Camera, Prairie Dawn

Shameless hipster muppetwhoring: it's not just for Kermit anymore! From Hands In Orifices In The Workplace And Hey, Dov Charney! What's That Woman Doing Behind You? Journal comes this news: Sesame Street and American Apparel have teamed up to...
[read the full post...]

October 2, 2009

DT Friday Freakout: Unfit Mothers Edition

Sometimes it can be really hard to sit on some of these newly released studies all week and not freak out about them. But this way, it only ruins the weekend: The BBC's headline which took a new Institute of...
[read the full post...]

October 1, 2009

Big Birther

Why don't the liberal communists at PBS want American children to see this footage? Are they too busy cutting licensing deals with diaper manufacturers? Don't want to rock the boatload of money they're making from forcing Tickle Me Abby Cadabby...
[read the full post...]

'Good Work, Sycophants'

With this Mad Men segment where Muppets sit around a boardroom and discuss advertising, Sesame Street has finally come full circle: The Children's Television Workshop's original 1968 pitch reel included an ongoing gag with a bunch of Muppet admen sitting...
[read the full post...]

September 25, 2009

OG Flintstones High Chair

You don't have to be Todd Oldham to appreciate the classic kitsch of Bedrock City; he's just the only one who photographed Bam Bam's or Pebble's painted concrete high chair for his new book. There are actually two Bedrock...
[read the full post...]

September 18, 2009

DT Friday Freakout: Back To School Edition

Just some news and science to freak out over this weekend: School officials summoned police to confront a family who rode their bikes to school together. They were told they were "out of compliance." [streetsblog via dt sr wtf correspondent...
[read the full post...]

September 15, 2009

¡ Ay Caramba! Los Mexican Wiggles!

You know, since Greg dropped out, Disney moved them to a, like, 5AM broadcast slot, and the kid lost interest, I haven't missed The Wiggles for a single second. BUT. Now they pop back up on Sprout like nothing...
[read the full post...]

September 9, 2009

You Know, It's Funny

This is Merrill Markoe talking here. She created the David Letterman Show , among many other things, and is really damn funny and insightful:The stuff that happens in early childhood, before you're three years old, you know, that's who you're...
[read the full post...]

The Secret To Great Comedy: Ti...MING

Or as Steve Martin might put it today, edi-TING: [via andrew sullivan]...
[read the full post...]

September 8, 2009

The Triumph Of The Crayolatariat

On the Fourth of July, we took the kids to The Crayola Factory: A Hands-on Discovery Center in downtown Easton, Pennsylvania. Though it's impossible to say such crafty entertainment could not be found without three hours in the car, the...
[read the full post...]

September 4, 2009

Swedish-Male Nipple Engorgers: This Sort Of Thing Is My Bag, Baby

Ragnar Bengtsson is the Mjölkmannen, the Milkman. He's a 26-year-old dad and grad student who just began trying to produce breast milk for some Swedish TV show. He'll be pumping every three hours all Fall. You can follow his...
[read the full post...]

September 3, 2009

Babyproofing With Martin Short

In 1993, Martin Short starred in Home Safe a 40-minute walkthrough of vital babyproofing advice and information. It's as funny as a heart attack baby swallowing a balloon. [Some context: that was two years after Father of the Bride,...
[read the full post...]

September 1, 2009

Muppet Improv Anywhere: Sesame Street Handclapping Number

Just walked by the TV where the kid is watching Sesame Street Old School, Vol. 1, when this awesome pickup handclapping jam session came on. I'd completely forgotten about that. Anyway, now I want to make it into my...
[read the full post...]

August 24, 2009

DT Monday Mommy Mailbag

It's been a while since I've dumped a mess of mommy marketing material on here. At first, I thought I was in trouble because I wasn't getting as many tone-deaf, gender-ridiculous press releases; what would I mock on the blog?...
[read the full post...]

My Name's Doug, And My Cool Trick Is Painting Starbucks Cups

Here's a modern craftywork project from Our Gen X Ambassador Douglas Coupland: Something "kids can do by themself [sic], or maybe grandparents need something to do." Or Gen X'ers who look like grandparents. [youtube via dt reader chris]...
[read the full post...]

August 19, 2009

No, Elmo, I'm Your Father!

From Daily Finance, the money vertical/portal section of AOL's content strategy v8.0:Elmo, Sesame Street's most giggly spokesmonster, is going through some tough economic times. His mommy has lost her job. Elmo's daddy is still working. (Note: A Sesame spokeswoman...
[read the full post...]

August 5, 2009

Men Shop At Mars, Parents Shop At Venus

Well, it's taken me a few years, but I think I finally have it all figured out: parenting, the difference between moms and dads, between quality and crap, between magazines and blogs, how to fluff an advertiser. And it's...
[read the full post...]

This Week On Stardates Of Our Lives

You know how the first Star Trek series was just a string of adventures, and then Next Generation a little, but definitely by Deep Space Nine, the whole thing was a giant soap opera in space? If you didn't think...
[read the full post...]

July 31, 2009

Every Dad Thing Is Terrible

Wow, I'd never thought of it before, but the WTFound footage cesspool/paradise Everything is Terrible is also the most important parenting resource ever! Hi, I'm Yogi Ogi Dogi?? And my yogic black rooster friend Rasta? Dadaerobics? This video is barely...
[read the full post...]

July 29, 2009

It's Alright, Stewardess, I Speak Muppet Jive

Man, but there were some groovy urban muppets livin' on The 'Street back in the day. If I ever saw this segment as a kid where Roosevelt Franklin leads the class in a lesson on African pride, it was clearly...
[read the full post...]

July 24, 2009

Mallet Time! Break It Down

Yesterday I was firing up the DVD player for the kid, and when I turned the TV on, there was a frustrated white man in a parking lot with a stroller. He slammed it on the ground, then smashed it...
[read the full post...]

Dan Meth's Comic Influences? You're Soaking In It!

IN: This video montage of artist/illustrator Dan Meth shows his influences and inspirations in roughly chronological order of exposure. OUT: And this animation montage of more movies adapted from toys is the output. If it were just Care Bears...
[read the full post...]

July 12, 2009

Real-G: Life-size Gundam Lands In Tokyo

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } CIMG6990, originally uploaded by ryoki. That is mecha-mazing. To commemorate the 30th anniversary of Gundam,...
[read the full post...]

July 6, 2009

Evian Street Skating Crew Brings It

The only thing crazier than an Evian commercialful of roller discoing babies is realizing that to shoot in Central Park means following US child labor laws, which limit the hours/day a child performer can work. The only practical way...
[read the full post...]

July 5, 2009

Mmmm, Muppet Mashup

Mashup master dj BC told Cory: "In honor of my daughter's first birthday- and one month late- I'm rolling out 'Muppet Mashup.' Ten mashups, remixes, and covers of music from The Muppet Show and Sesame Street. With the legendary...
[read the full post...]

July 2, 2009

They Might Be Patriots: A Schoolhouse Rockin' Weekend

We're going to take a little family trip to Philadelphia for the Independence Day weekend, so posting may be a bit scarce here on Daddy Types. Meanwhile, I've loaded some appropriate educational materials onto the iPod to help the kid...
[read the full post...]

June 26, 2009

'I Like What I Look Like'

From the incomparable 1974 landmark TV event, "Free to be...you and me": Daddy Types, 2007:As a teenager, Michael Jackson once looked in a mirror and saw a curvy black woman. Roberta Flack, to be exact. I think we all would've...
[read the full post...]

June 20, 2009

Educational & Entertaining: Why, They're As Different As Colored And White

Did you know that when the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was created in 1967, a Republican congressman from Texas proposed an amendment forbidding the "educational stations" from offering "entertainment"? These were the two opposing ends of the media spectrum back...
[read the full post...]

Did Mister Rogers Really Save Public Television In That Hearing?

I was watching the classic footage again last night, where Fred Rogers testified before the Senate and powerfully defended public television and won over the steely hearts of the politicians by, well, by just him being him. As Graham...
[read the full post...]

June 17, 2009

And In Other Annoying, Talentless, Manipulative Hack News...

Jill Greenberg made babies cry, and then took their picture. Glenn Beck makes himself--and anyone with two neurons to rub together--cry on his flame-fanning, wingnut TV show. Greenberg's 2004 exhibit of her crybaby photos was called "End Times." Glenn...
[read the full post...]

Just Do What The Muppets Say, And No One Gets Hurt

Yeah, sure I knew Jim Henson's Muppets predated Sesame Street and that most were created for commercials. In the abstract. There were even a few Muppet ads screening last summer at the Smithsonian's otherwise forgettable Jim Henson Legacy exhibition. But...
[read the full post...]

June 11, 2009

Nightmare On Sesame Street, By Jeremy Natividad

Jeremy Natividad did this scary doodle of Sesame Street monsters gone bad. You can see more of his work here or on his blog, Mighty Robot. [via carlovely's tumblr--seriously, is every single tumblr a dope hipsterfest?--thanks dt reader and...
[read the full post...]

June 8, 2009

One Was Johnny

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } Johnny Carson & Nauga, originally uploaded by grickily. The other was Nauga, and the third,...
[read the full post...]

June 6, 2009

DT Friday Freakout: Russian Mice Breast Pump Edition

The Freakout's roundup of overwrought science, safety, and parenting news ruineth your weekend--and it unruineth [?] it with a little dose of Uma: The California Senate passed a ban on BPA in baby bottles and sippy cups this week, one...
[read the full post...]

May 29, 2009

wee see: Video Tai-Chi For Babies

The whole problem with the "Oh, my 6-month-old just loves Baby Einstein! I put her in front of it and she's transfixed!" concept of baby videos is precisely the transfixed part. It's not that she's so into Baby Einstein,...
[read the full post...]

May 28, 2009

There's A Fete In My Tummy! Yo Gabba Gabba Producer Is Obama's New Ambassador To France

Ho. Ly. Smokes. Avec une cerise on top. Charlie Rivkin, the CEO of Wildbrain, which executive produces Yo Gabba Gabba!, was just named as President Obama's ambassador to France. In other world-shaking news, YGG! got picked up for another season....
[read the full post...]

May 15, 2009

Where The Wild Sweater Things Are

Hello, crazy Dutchman Koos Van Der Akker, who made those Cosby sweaters that sent dad fashion completely off the rails for most of the 1980s! Hello, awesome blog named We Love You So about all the crazy inspirations and...
[read the full post...]

May 6, 2009

Daddy Talked, Adults Educated

A quick recap of the Adult Education lectures last night at Union Hall: it was awesome. Not quite knowing what to expect, I was kind of unsure how my Sesame Street timeline [aka Can you tell me how to get--how...
[read the full post...]

May 4, 2009

Daddy Talks, Tues. @ Adult Ed: Children's Educational Television, An Illustrated History

This month, the topic for Adult Ed, the awesome, esoteric, funny, and useless lecture series--in fact, it's "Brooklyn's favorite useless lecture series"--is Ambivalent Parenting. I know, right? I feel so targeted, too. But I'm actually on the program. Here's the...
[read the full post...]

May 3, 2009

Fifth Circuit Appeals Court Step On Barney, Too

When I started reading this 1999 ruling from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in the trademark infringement case of Lyons v. Giannoulas, I was offended. Didn't the judge--or his clerk, more likely--have any consideration for the seriousness of...
[read the full post...]

Malaysian Dads Love The Drypers

Did you know that for a while there in the early 1990s, Drypers were the next big things in diapers? It's true. A startup founded by three guys in Texas was growing like crazy, putting pressure on the diaper industry's...
[read the full post...]

April 27, 2009

Moving To A Higher State Of Baby Consciousness

The Boston Globe has an interesting article on the emergent techniques for measuring babies' brain development and activity, and how these advances are changing the commonly accepted model for how babies' brains work and develop. On one level, it's trippy...
[read the full post...]

April 26, 2009

The Gospel According To Jelly Telly

It may have taken God just six days to create the world, but it's been almost two months, and the folks creating JellyTelly, which wants to be God's Chosen YouTube Channel, still got a lot of work to do....
[read the full post...]

April 22, 2009

We're Comic Books From The Government, And We're Here To Help

The library at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln has a collection of government-sponsored comic books. Here are some of them, starting with my favorite. The rest are just filler, pretty much: Pogo: Primer for Parents from the TV Division of the...
[read the full post...]

April 9, 2009

He's Right There In The Chair, Dear, Don't You See Him?

K2 doesn't know what a holiday is, and the kid figured out who the Easter Bunny was two Christmases ago, so CaptureTheMagic.com will not help us dupe our kids--about the Easter Bunny, anyway. That said, if they'd let me use...
[read the full post...]

April 6, 2009

Some People In The Neighborhood Crave A Mister Rogers Cover Album

You probably have a dozen or so lodged in your brain, but Fred Rogers composed and wrote over 200 songs. I'd like to think some serious musical types are poring over them, looking for some material to arrange, record,...
[read the full post...]

April 3, 2009

Phil & Teds Has No Triumphant Video!

When DT published the news last week that Phil & Teds was buying its bankrupt competitor Mountain Buggy in an all-New Zealand deal, I came off sounding too harsh about Phil & Teds owner/CEO Campbell Gower's earlier gloating about MB's...
[read the full post...]

April 2, 2009

Cool Tricks: Eefin' & Hambonin' On Hee Haw

Hi, my name's Jackie Phelps. And my name's Jimmie Riddle. And our cool trick is hambonin' and eefin'. [youtube via dinosaurs and robots] Or as the fancypants at NPR like to spell it, Eephing: Jimmie Riddle and the Lost...
[read the full post...]

April 1, 2009

Peepsisqatsi

Boy, you'd never see this "How do they make ____?" film on Sesame Street. Alas, it's only a slideshow: How Peeps are made [chitrib/getty images]...
[read the full post...]

March 26, 2009

Milk, The Mayor Of Sesame Street

I'd completely forgotten about this till ten minutes ago. Milk is a documentary short from Sesame Street's "How do they make ___?" golden era, the 1970's. Like the classic crayon film, and unlike their chatty competition over there in...
[read the full post...]

March 23, 2009

Picture Yourself On A Plane. On An Island. A Bunny With Flower-scope Eyes

So while I'm waiting to see any response from Oilily about Rosa Pomar's flower-eyed bunny dolls and what looks like a cut-n-dry case of knockoffery, some new developments have come to light about the history of one design element...
[read the full post...]

March 18, 2009

Yow! Gabba Gabba! DJ Jack Black

Like I said, choose your licensed children's characters carefully, because they're gonna haunt you for the rest of your life. Jack Black in a DJ Lance Rock outfit. Goodbye, Goodbye, Goodbye, Goodbye, from the YGG! Season 2 episode "New...
[read the full post...]

Welcome To The Hotel Dora: You Can Grow Out Of It Any Time You Want, But You Can Never Leave

I knew it was a bad week, finger-on-the-pulse-wise when I learned about Nickelodeon and Mattel's plans to launch Tween Dora on NPR's weekend quiz show, "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me." But I needn't have worried. That was just the...
[read the full post...]

March 16, 2009

Mammas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Formula-Fed Sicklings

Damn, baby! Nobody told me that 2004 US Dept. of Health & Human Services Breastfeeding Awareness Campaign with the public service annoucement featuring a [black?!] pregnant mom riding a mechanical bull also had radio spots! Or that those radio...
[read the full post...]

March 12, 2009

Grover, Can You Spare A Dime? Sesame Workshop Lays Off 20% Of Employees

Sesame Workshop announced layoffs of 67 employees today, roughly 20 percent of the non-profit company's workforce. In a statement to the Financial Times, the Workshop said it was "not immune to the unprecedented challenges of today's economic environment," and that...
[read the full post...]

March 11, 2009

Hey Kids, Can You Say Pendejo?

For one brief, shining, hilarious moment at the end of this Jon Stewart clip about his feud with Jim Cramer and the CNBC/NBC/MSNBC conglomernaut, I felt a swelling of synergistic gratitude in my heart for Viacom. Unfortunately, that was...
[read the full post...]

March 10, 2009

Thank You, Greatest Generation!

I don't read Thomas Friedman's column regularly, but if he promises to quote The Onion and make me think of Wonder Showzen from now on, I'll give him a chance. The Onion quote you can read for yourself. But...
[read the full post...]

I Remember These Legs

[via]...
[read the full post...]

March 4, 2009

Harvard Study As Close To Harvard As Baby Einstein's Gonna Get

A Harvard Medical School study of almost 900 kids ages 0-3 found that watching television and baby-targeted DVDs did not, in fact, promote learning or brain development. Even though 6 mo kids in the study were averaging nearly an hour/day...
[read the full post...]

March 2, 2009

Some Phony Survey: Dads Flake Out On Books, Should Watch More TV

"A mere 3% of fathers read to their children, compared with 89% of mothers." Somehow, even aunts and uncles read to kids twice as frequently [6%] as their own dads. At least that's the lead finding of a pointless online...
[read the full post...]

February 28, 2009

The Sound Of One-Hand Scolding

A media cluckstorm erupted in the UK this week after the BBC reported with that "some parents," including "a minority of parents" on the broadcasters' online forums, "complained" or "expressed concern" that Cerrie Burnell, a new presenter on CBeebies, the...
[read the full post...]

February 4, 2009

8 Is Enough For The Pilot, Anyway

You know, I prefer not to discuss octuplets unless they're named Nahasapeemapetilon. So I've kept the whole, single, baby-obsessed mom living at home with her 14 IVF kids story off Daddy Types. Because seriously, what Then someone forwarded me an...
[read the full post...]

February 1, 2009

The Schoolhouse Rock They Don't Want You To See

Sure, "they" claim this "Conspiracy Rock" expose' on the JFK assassination is just a parody created by some comedy troupe at Emerson College in 1991, and animated--by hand, no less!--by Jason Scott of textfiles.com. But I can't believe it;...
[read the full post...]

January 28, 2009

Keep Thinking Pink, CBC

I just finished listening to Sue Palmer, the author of Toxic Childhood, which was the hook for that bafflingly ridiculous BBC article about how girls' brainwashed obsession with the color pink is bad--even if it doesn't alter their DNA. Palmer...
[read the full post...]

January 20, 2009

HeyDon't Mean To Be A Bother, You Guys

Yes, according, I guess, to the NY Times' Gen X correspondent, the new version of The Electric Company is as boring and educational as you feared. Back From the '70s, Without the Zaniness [nyt]...
[read the full post...]

January 15, 2009

Mr Private Equity And Little Miss Licensing

I guess I didn't grow up in an Anglophilic enough house, because I didn't know about Roger Hargreaves' Mr. Men and Little Miss series until the kid was born. [The wife, on the other hand, had them at school....
[read the full post...]

December 28, 2008

Your Hair Will Someday Be Tall And Pretty!

The wife didn't watch the show that much, so she doesn't understand the sharpness of my pain when she says K2 needs a haircut because she looks "like that kid on The Simpsons."...
[read the full post...]

December 23, 2008

DIY Bantha Plush: Finally, Something Good Comes From The Star Wars Holiday Special

Anyone who has ever seen the 1978 variety showsploitation travesty that was the Star Wars Holiday Special cannot pretend to have been betrayed by the treacly offenses of baby Annakin and Jar Jar Binks. We knew Lucas had it...
[read the full post...]

Thomas The Annoyance Engine, Now In CGI

I am not a Thomas fan, and thankfully, neither kid is either, so I'm happy to ignore them. I always considered it to be a giant toy- and merchandise racket, and that was even before a hundred million lead-tainted trains...
[read the full post...]

December 17, 2008

John Denver And Muppets Singing "Silent Night"

From that other Muppet Christmas Special. If you're in the crowd shots at the end, I hope you'll give us a heads up in the comments: Search YouTube for John Denver Muppets Christmas [youtube, thanks to jason for the idea]...
[read the full post...]

Sorry Disney, It's Not That Easy Minting Green

It didn't take a hollow Christmas special full of pointless celebrity cameos to turn me off of Disney's massive, orchestrated Muppet revival remonetization. Kermit's ridiculous faux-edgy poseur publicity stunts with skate rat brand Supreme, skank photographer Terry Richardson, and fashion...
[read the full post...]

December 12, 2008

I'll Have What He's Having: Orgasmic Birth

From the New York Times comes [sic] word that next month ABC's 20/20 will air Orgasmic Birth, a documentary by Debra Pascali-Bonaro, who is a birth educator, doula and, it's safe to assume, orgasm advocate. Finally, someone who will stand...
[read the full post...]

December 11, 2008

Crochet A Circle. Crochet A Circle Now. YGG OG Amigurumi

Wow. I wanna go to the crocheting party in etsy seller Crafty Is Cool's tummy, too. Sure, she's created plans and kits for making your own amigurumi versions of Yo Gabba Gabba! characters. Which is great. But if you...
[read the full post...]

December 7, 2008

ABCDEFGHIJKLSD

Though it seems to be from the same era as the 4-armed swami, I have a feeling the backgrounds in this Sesame Street alphabet were not inspired by artfully printed, 19th century design pattern sourcebooks. Sesame Street - Psychedelic...
[read the full post...]

December 1, 2008

Minivan Improvement: Tim Allen's Supercharged Saleen Windstar On eBay

At the peak of his Home Improvement fame, when he also had a best-selling book and was the voice of Buzz Lightyear, Tim Allen was consumed by one all-important question: ""If a man was to drive a minivan, what...
[read the full post...]

November 28, 2008

DT Freakout Friday: Thanks A Lot Edition

Some alarming news and way-too-preliminary research to be thankful for this week: Thanks a lot, FDA, for the giant hit to your credibility about this whole melanine-in-baby-formula thing. I was all prepared to be all, "Bah, melamine-tainted formula is a...
[read the full post...]

November 13, 2008

I'd Like To Be Told. When It's Going To Suck: Busted Mister Rogers Talking Key Chain

A few months back, I felt like a heretic even asking the question, whether some slightly expanded, thoughtful licensed merchandise from Mister Rogers' Neighborhood might not be a nice alternative to parents facing down the Sesame Street juggernaut. Now...
[read the full post...]

November 11, 2008

Muppet News Flash: Sesame Street Coming To YouTube, &c.!

Hi-ho, Kermit the Frog here: Sesame Workshop announced that clips from Sesame Street will be uploaded to YouTube. Seriously. While you're processing that stunning development, they also announced that clips would be available on NBC's YouTube competitor Hulu.com. And...
[read the full post...]

October 29, 2008

Brooke Shields: The Sally Struthers Of The Routan Generation

Uh, wow. I can understand how tough it must be to sell a rebranded Chrysler Town & Country minivan as an actual, German car. " But if I were in Volkswagen's marketing department, I probably would have gone the, "Technically,...
[read the full post...]

Wow. A Cure For The Wiggles

It's funny, The Wiggles used to really bug me--and then we stopped letting the kid watch them, and they dropped off her radar. Problem solved. Awesome how that works. If your kid isn't so easily weaned from his Wiggles obsession,...
[read the full post...]

October 28, 2008

Sublime Muppet X Station Wagon Mashup In Germany

In order to issue someone a speed camera ticket in Germany, it's necessary to have an identifiable photo of the driver, not just the car's license plate. Which, because of the sensitive camera calibrations, means all you need to...
[read the full post...]

October 25, 2008

On The Road With Misters T And JDG

Jim found a 1983 coloring book, On The Road With Mr. T in a thrift store. "The captions were incredibly boring," he says, "so I rewrote some of them." And how. I cannot, for the life of me, imagine...
[read the full post...]

October 23, 2008

Orbit On The Office: You Can't Buy Publicity Like This

So after posting about the Orbit Baby System's appearance on The Office last week--and the ensuing discussion of the suckage of product placement, I got an email from Joseph Hei, the co-founder of Orbit. As you can see from...
[read the full post...]

October 21, 2008

Here Comes The Lost Steven Zuckerman "Imagination Rain" Again

Old School Sesame Street fans--and readers of DT and The Onion AV Club--will recall that of the three classic songs he recorded in 1970, composer/performer Steve Zuckerman liked "Imagination Rain," the ode to mind expansion, even more than his...
[read the full post...]

October 18, 2008

Orbit On The Office: "$1200? That's What I Spent On My Whole Bomb Shelter."

In this week's episode of The Office, Michael's throwing a baby shower for Jan's anonymous sperm donor baby. It's pretty hilarious front to back, but Dwight's test drive of the Orbit Baby System just might be the best stroller...
[read the full post...]

October 17, 2008

DT Friday Freakout: WTFormula Edition

Here, let me ruin your parenting weekend with worry and annoyances torn from the headlines and the annals of way-too-preliminary research: "HEY MOMS!" Holy crap, Similac's new pack could be the greatest thing since Nabisco Double Stuff Oreo-flavored formula, but...
[read the full post...]

What's The Story With The Four-Armed Swami Counting To Twenty?

Alright, so I'm a little obsessed with what is admittedly my favorite old school Sesame Street animation ever: the four-armed swami counting to 20. But what can I do? To this day, I don't say "Once, doce, trece, catorce"...
[read the full post...]

October 14, 2008

Translation: Bourdain's Kid Eats Mashed Corn, Rice, Cheese

I have a feeling tough guy/chef Anthony Bourdain dictates into a digital recorder, then has some lackey at the Travel Channel to type them up. His blog posts read like a stroll through the Umbrian market in his head, which...
[read the full post...]

October 7, 2008

James Earl Jones To The Alphabet: I'm Your Father

Did you know James Earl Jones not only had a stutter, he was functionally mute for like eight years? And that his counting to ten segment tested the best of all the clips in the Sesame Street pilot they...
[read the full post...]

October 5, 2008

"All I Smell Is Raw Power And Speed"

[via daring fireball] "Where the hell are the singin' cats?" is burned into my brain, but hearing David Letterman story about Paul Newman and their matching Volvo 960 station wagons which Newman's racing goons outfitted with Ford 302 V8 racing...
[read the full post...]

October 4, 2008

Seriously, Who Wrote The Music For That Sesame Street Crayon Movie?

PBS has been advertising on Daddy Types lately, for which I am grateful. But Sesame Workshop's media office has not responded to several requests for production information about the classic "How Crayons Are Made" movie. The Muppet Wiki information is...
[read the full post...]

September 27, 2008

Well, She WAS Born In Washington...

To our surprise, the kid said she wanted to skip story time last night to watch a few minutes of the presidential debate with us. She ended up watching intently for almost an hour on our bed before she finally...
[read the full post...]

September 26, 2008

Who Is Pankuro's Dancing Hamburger [?] Friend

When the kid wakes up with a dry bed, she gets to watch some of her favorite Japanese Underpants Videos, aka, Pantsu Pankuro, an animated short on NHK every morning about the big kid joys of using the toilet....
[read the full post...]

September 10, 2008

Laughing Babies Not Just For YouTube Anymore Last Year

9/17 update: Whoops, not so funny anymore, is it, AIG? Yeah, I lost count of laughing baby videos on YouTube, to the point that I didn't know AIG had licensed a few of them to use for an ad campaign....
[read the full post...]

September 9, 2008

Domo-Kun Shilling For Target? Or Vice Versa?

DT reader Caitlin wonders "how I feel about Domo shilling for Target." I feel it's all going perfectly according to the merchandising and TV plan that Big Tent Entertainment crafted 2.5 years ago when they licensed the character from...
[read the full post...]

August 26, 2008

Some Blogger Got Backstage At Yo Gabba Gabba Before I Did

So when we went to Los Angeles in the Spring, I tried to meet up with the Yo Gabba Gabba folks, introduce the kid, etc. They were really cool about it, but they were also in the last, frantic stages...
[read the full post...]

August 22, 2008

DT Friday Freakout's A Freakout, Except They Call It Le Freakout Edition

I had so much fun poring through the months-long buildup to the recent decision by the French government to ban television channels and programming that targets 0-3 year-olds--or as they're adorably called in French officialdom, "les tous petits." I mean,...
[read the full post...]

August 21, 2008

Liberte! Egalite! Pas De Bebe Tele!

The High Audiovisual Council of France has banned television programs targeting kids under 3 years of age because of the developmental risks posed by exposure of babies to screen media. The ban was precipitated by the 24-hr baby TV networks,...
[read the full post...]

August 16, 2008

Sesame Street Is Made By Crazy Theater People!

Holy smokes, I get it now! The gratuitous pop culture references, the fawning cameos by celebrities no child has ever heard of, it all makes sense! Sesame Street is created by aging theater people and puppeteers who are righttheresoclose to...
[read the full post...]

August 8, 2008

Win A Yo Gabba Gabba! Keycap In The DT WTF? Licensed Product Contest!

The Mall: The kids and I went to Hot Topic yesterday at the mall. [Actually, at the second mall; the first mall we went to on Wednesday didn't even have a Hot Topic. What the point of our country's...
[read the full post...]

August 5, 2008

Pick It Up Pick It Up Pick It Up Pick It Up Pick It Up Pick It Up

And so it starts. Yo Gabba Gabba! toys have been spotted at Target. Noisy ones, too. Also: Borat-style swimsuits for boys. Or so it would appear. Yo Gabba Gabba Toys at Target [nontoxicreviews]...
[read the full post...]

August 2, 2008

Don't Forget, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood Is Slated For Demolition

So PBS can build some glitzy, new kiddie mall. See the details here and get on the horn to PBS....
[read the full post...]

August 1, 2008

Sesame Street Is Brought To You By The Letters T and V

Feist can't help you now; there are way more than 1,2,3,4 celebrities stuffed into this trailer [sic] for the new season of Sesame Street. Which is nothing new. This 35th anniversary montage is full of celebrity cameos over the...
[read the full post...]

July 31, 2008

Now Patti LaBelle Knows Her ABC's

Turns out not all the Elmo Era Sesame Street is a writeoff. Who knew?...
[read the full post...]

July 29, 2008

Holy Smokes, PBS Is Dropping Mister Rogers?? This Must Be Stopped.

Is this true?? PBS is dropping Mister Rogers' Neighborhood from its daily syndicated feed to its local affiliate stations in September, and instead sending out a single episode on weekends?? How in the world are local affiliates supposed to air...
[read the full post...]

July 27, 2008

BBC Olympic Monkey By Gorillaz' Dads

I don't know what NBC's Olympic routine includes, but they already receive an automatic 0.5 point deduction for not having Jamie Hewlett and Damon Alborn create a Gorillaz-style Monkey from a Chinese fable as a mascot. Here's an embeddable...
[read the full post...]

July 26, 2008

Mio & Mao & The Other Awesome Stop Animation Of Francesco Messeri

Who knew, Francesco Messeri is the Florentine master of stop-action animation, and he has been for at least a generation. Messeri's Mio Mao is a series of short adventures of a pair of claymation kittens. Quaq Quao is a...
[read the full post...]

July 24, 2008

Thank You, Target, May I Have Another? Elmo LikeABike Knockoff

So maybe Target was just testing the waters when they steamrolled Like-A-Bike last year with their own $50 made-in-China knockoff. Because not only are they back, they're expecting you to pay ten bucks more for the Elmo version and...
[read the full post...]

July 20, 2008

Wow, Wow What Have We Here? Plush Noggin 'Clones'

When you've been sewing for 50 years like Gramma Ruth, you don't "knock off" anything, least of all the so-far unlicensed, unmonetized characters of some media conglomerate-come-lately like Nickelodeon. No, when you make your own homebrew plush versions of...
[read the full post...]

It's Not Easy Being In The Smithsonian's Jim Henson Exhibit

The girls and I went to the Jim Henson Legacy exhibition that just opened in some basement gallery at the Smithsonian, so you don't have to. Seriously, just put it in a book. Or a file folder, what a...
[read the full post...]

July 16, 2008

Jim Henson's Early Experimental Films ARE Online After All

While he was still getting the whole Muppet thing off the ground, Jim Henson also created some seriously serious, experimental films. His 1964 short, Time Piece, is eight-and-a-half minutes of surreal stop-action animation and what not--including a 60's-style stripper, heads...
[read the full post...]

Hmm, Lots Of Vintage Video Clips In This New SesameStreet.org Screenshot

According to the dutiful Times article, the new & improved Sesame Street website will be previewed at BlogHer this weekend. Seeing as how I'm not going, I will just wait patiently to hear the reviews. But judging from the...
[read the full post...]

July 15, 2008

Whoops, Old School Sesame Street Not Graded For Spelling

Was just scrolling through the YouTube with the kid for a minute and found this. It looks like the work of Fred Calvert's studio, which also did the animation for Steve Zuckerman's "I in the Sky." Did I mention...
[read the full post...]

July 9, 2008

Go Audition To Be The Voice of Diego, GO!

Holy smokes, do they pay in free bedding sets and melamine dishware?? Nick Jr. is looking RIGHT NOW for a new voice of Diego, to record "ASAP!" Does your kid fit the bill? If you're anywhere near the demo for...
[read the full post...]

July 4, 2008

Area Baby Hates Getting Shots, Socialized Medicine

Well, we're off to Grandma's house for a patriotic dip in the pool and some patriotic meat. I'll wish you all the same. Meanwhile, if you're looking for a Friday Freakout, try this on for size: evil communists touting...
[read the full post...]

June 19, 2008

Get This AP Profile Of Caroll Spinney While You Can

My wife saved the free newspaper from the subway the other day, which contains a fluffy but interesting AP profile by Ellen Simon of Caroll Spinney, who has played Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch since the first season of...
[read the full post...]

June 18, 2008

Redemption Song? 'World's Worst Interviewer' Still Has Harp, Spot On God's Buddy List

Here's a hypothetical for you: Let's say you're a producer for ABC/NBC/same diff, and you perpetrate what is hands-down, the cringingly worstest celebrity interview ever with, I don't know, pick a name--Holly Hunter. And though only like a thousand...
[read the full post...]

June 17, 2008

Fusentaro

The kid likes the one-legged jump roping. Me, it's this one here, with the stilts and the glazed donut. That's my favorite video of Japan's own Steve-O-in-a-balloon, Fusen-taro. [風船太郎, Balloon Boy. The last two characters, -taro, are used in...
[read the full post...]

So THAT's What's In Crinkly Books

Sheesh, NonToxicReviews makes me feel so unproductive. I don't know what you did last weekend, but Mr. Stinkhead created PDF's and howto's for two awesome DIY kid's books in the course of just three days--and the one day he...
[read the full post...]

June 13, 2008

RIP, Thomas Creat-- Wait, David Mitton Animated The Thunderbirds!

David Mitton, the children's TV producer who brought The Rev. Wilbert Vere Awdry's bedtime stories of Thomas the Tank Engine to lucrative, oddly animated life, has died. But Thomas Schmomas, the guy also did The Thunderbirds! That means Thomas...
[read the full post...]

June 12, 2008

We'll Wrap Up Our Own Nostalgia, Thanks, Strawberry Shortcake

So there was a big licensing expo in New York this week, which apparently resulted in a phony trend story in the NY Times about companies redesigning their old licensed character properties to milk a new generation of nostalgic parents:...
[read the full post...]

That Explains The Lukes, But Where Are The Lauras?

A study in the works at Harvard shows that Brazilian telenovelas have an impact--in Brazil, anyway--on lowering fertility rates and on baby name choices. From the abstract:We focus on fertility choices in Brazil, a country where soap operas (novelas) portray...
[read the full post...]

June 11, 2008

Daddy, Where To Cartoons Come From?

Over the weekend, two major comic artists, Art Spiegelman and Gary Panter, discussed their inspiration at a symposium organized by NYU and The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art. Via Artforum's report:The letters L, S, and D rolled off their...
[read the full post...]

May 30, 2008

There's A Party In My Pampers!

What the hell are you doing in there, tickling? Get OUT of my kid's diaper before I wring your little red neck!...
[read the full post...]

May 20, 2008

DT Headline Roundup: Peace & Love Edition

From the Boston Globe's profile of early childhood development researcher Nancy Carlsson-Paige, all I can figure about her new book, Taking Back Childhood: Helping Your Kids Thrive in a Fast-Paced, Media-Saturated, Violence-Filled World, is that kids should cut back...
[read the full post...]

May 19, 2008

The Original Mah-Na Mah-Na, In English

This Similac Sucrose thing has got me going, so I'm off to investigate the scientific and regulatory background of the Baby Formula Industrial Complex. As soon as I watch this original [1] 1969 version of The Muppets singing Mah-Na Mah-Na...
[read the full post...]

May 16, 2008

Bill Gates' Magic Robot

Let's all come and play with DJ Bill Gates today! What Gates showed on Wednesday was a 4-foot-by-6-foot prototype called TouchWall. Among the things that appealed to me was the idea that presentations might shift away from the sort of...
[read the full post...]

May 15, 2008

The Class of 2008 Were Not Conceived On A Thursday

So Harvard Law professor Lawrence Tribe tells the graduating class at NYU that on this, the biggest day of their lives, they should think about their parents having sex:Think about it — if your mother and father had watched...
[read the full post...]

May 12, 2008

Hey You Guyyys!!! CTW Is Remaking, Probably Ruining, The Electric Company

Let's be realistic; with it's third-generation Laugh-In format, cheesy acting, and random-at-best pedagogy, the original Electric Company was not great television to begin with, and it definitely has not aged well. So any OG purist objections to the recent...
[read the full post...]

May 10, 2008

It Is Really, Really Not Easy Being Green. Really.

Wow, just wow. Better put the kids down for a nap before watching Sad Kermit do his cover versions of Elliot Smith's "Needle in the Hay" (The Royal Tenenbaums mix) or NIN's "Hurt." Funny thing is, I've watched the...
[read the full post...]

May 7, 2008

Yo Gabba Gabba!: It's What The Kids Are Watching These Days. WHEN THEY'RE HIGH.

This just in: ABC News reports that college students smoke pot. And watch Yo Gabba Gabba. Which is funny, because I remember when it was launched, some raver described it as the Teletubbies with the Ecstasy baked right in. But...
[read the full post...]

DT Headline Roundup: First, The Bad Ideas Edition

So a family from Northern Ireland goes to Portugal for a little vacation, by the evening, the parents are puking, the kids [ages 6, 2, and 1] are in protective custody, and there's a court appearance set for drunken...
[read the full post...]

April 30, 2008

One Of These Things Doesn't Belong Here

I know The 'Street was edgier back in the day, but still. The synopsis list on our DVR fakes me out every. single. time:Rosita finds other uses for her wings. Gabi and Big Bird baby-sit for Natasha. Baby Bear...
[read the full post...]

April 21, 2008

I'm Kenny Scharf's Kid-Sized Gumby Chair, Dammit!

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } Keith Haring, originally uploaded by mario.mc. So obviously, I found this photo of Keith Haring...
[read the full post...]

April 13, 2008

PandaPanther's Yo Gabba Gabba Season 2 Animation Turning Up Online?

Huh. No. The show hasn't started shooting the live segments yet, but it looks like some of--at least one of--the new animated songs for Yo Gabba Gabba's second season is already online. [At least it looks like that if...
[read the full post...]

Oshiri Kajiri Mushi Goods, Finally

I've grown a bit skeptical of the origins of most every sudden Japanese trend. With the Oshiri Kajiri Mushi, aka Bottom Biting Bug, cartoon that washed over Japan last summer, it wasn't until the late fall/Christmas season before Japan's...
[read the full post...]

April 5, 2008

Goodnight, Seagull. Goodnight, Sprout. Goodnight, Bedtime Television Going Ballsout

"It's time for bed now. Goodnight, from Aquafresh." As so-called "researchers, pediatricians, cognitive development scientists, and neurologists" stoke the fires of outrage and goad their non-profit lackeys, the heartless, joykilling communistic social activists to attack, where can a worn out...
[read the full post...]

Vamanos! NAFTAstic Dora Minivan Of Canada

Do not adjust your screen. You are not dreaming. NAFTA is real, and it is working hard for Canadian children every. single. minute. That IS a photo of an American minivan [the Chevrolet Uplander, made in Doraville, Georgia! Until...
[read the full post...]

March 27, 2008

Awesome: WWE Wresting To Launch Kids Magazine

ProWrestling.com Imagery: Bombshells (1252) Female Celebrities (495) Male Celebrities (3) Shane McMahon, WWE Wrestling's EVP of Global Media/professional son, announced WWE Kids, a pro wrestling magazine aimed at 6-14 year-olds, which is part of the bigger WWE Youth Initiative:Every...
[read the full post...]

"Hot Dog: A Program About Stuff" Starring Woody Allen & Jonathan Winters. Huh?

Hot Dog was a children's television series that ran for one season (1970) on NBC's Saturday morning. Called "The Show About Stuff," it was basically the network version of the "How do they make _____?" segments from Mister Rogers...
[read the full post...]

March 26, 2008

Kermit The Frog Here, In The Cold, Dead Vacuum Of Space

Kermit the attention-whoring frog was last seen trying to reclaim the irreparably lost cool of his youth by doing a photoshoot for skate emperors Supreme with noted downtown skanktographer Terry Richardson. Then he resurfaced a couple of weeks later,...
[read the full post...]

March 24, 2008

Horton Hears Who, Freaks Out Kid, Gets Dad Thinking

So the kid went to a theater for her first, actual movie over the weekend: Horton Hears A Who. It totally freaked her out. Technically, her first movie ever was John Cassavetes' Shadows, which she watched with me when...
[read the full post...]

March 20, 2008

How To Make Buttons And/Or Screw With Your Kid's Mind

In honor of Won't You Be My Neighbor Day [Did you all remember to wear your sweaters? Good, I knew you could.], achingly adorable writer/filmmaker/hipster moll Miranda July takes us on a trip to a button factory. A button...
[read the full post...]

March 19, 2008

Steve Zuckerman's Awesome, Moody, Hippie Songs On Sesame Street

These things are like Pringles; once you open the can and have one, you just can't stop. The kid was really withdrawn and bummin' when she came home from pre-school this afternoon, so we sat down to an episode...
[read the full post...]

WTD: 4-Handed Swami To Count Pinball Number Count Cover Versions

Seriously, that DJ Food remix and The Family Guy are just the tip of the iceberg. At his music blog Fong Song, blogger Fongolia has tallied up at least 17 cover versions of "Pinball Number Count," the classic Sesame...
[read the full post...]

Nickelodeon's ParentsConnect Useful For Dads With No Other Humor Outlet

So I pointed out yesterday that Nickelodeon's executives described "moms" and kids "on mom's lap" as two prime targets for their new $100 million, 600+ games, online marketing push. Which is a little lame, but mostly, it's fine, and not...
[read the full post...]

March 18, 2008

Thanks, Nickelodeon! Another Website Dads Need To Know Nothing About

NickJr.com with Delta/AmEx ad, for when you're feeling not so fresh, I guess Viacom division Nickelodeon unveiled the first of 600 new online games designed to strengthen "the brand affiliation" and to deliver young eyeballs to advertisers, including the...
[read the full post...]

March 17, 2008

Pregnant With Meaning: A Reproductive Reading Of What's Opera, Doc?

This morning I wrote a bit about the origins of the phrase, "the rabbit died," which was a common, if inaccurate, euphemism for a positive result on a pregnancy test, which in post-WWII America was called the rabbit test....
[read the full post...]

From Kill The Wabbit To Pee On A Stick: A History Of The Pregnancy Test

1978 is the 30th anniversary of the home pregnancy test, which was developed by pioneering researchers in reproductive endocrinology at the National Institutes of Health. "A Thin Blue Line" is the NIH's online history of the project, and it makes...
[read the full post...]

March 14, 2008

The Poster You May Not Want To See In The Nursery

If your name's James, that is. This poster by Ben Hribar was made for some hippie dippie, peace love & understanding exhibition in 2006. It "addresses the disconnect and apathy of the general public towords [sic] their fellow brothers...
[read the full post...]

March 10, 2008

March 20th Is Won't You Be A Neighbor By Wearing A Sweater? Day

I swear, I didn't know about this. Next week, Thursday, March 20th, would be Fred Rogers' 80th birthday. The standardbearers at Family Communications, Inc., Rogers' production company, are encouraging everyone to wear a sweater--I repeat, to wear a sweater--on...
[read the full post...]

March 8, 2008

Going Back For A Day In The Neighborhood

When Google Video first launched, it seemed like no matter what you searched for, the results were always 9-part interviews with public television pioneers by the Archive of American Television. Joan Ganz Cooney can keep waiting, but I picked and...
[read the full post...]

March 5, 2008

Before They Were Sued: "Doctor's should prescribe these [Baby Einstein] videos for colicky babies!"

Lost in the over-earnest debate about the supposed educational value of Baby Einstein videos is any sense of the innocent, dewy-eyed days before the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended no screen-based media for kids under 2-yo. before those damn...
[read the full post...]

Baby Einstein Tweaks Copy, Dodges FTC Complaint, Drives Anti-TV Activists Cuh-razy

from the Baby Einstein website circa 2004 VICTORY! [Cue crickets] From the tree falling in a forest department, we learn that "The Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood is claiming victory after Baby Einstein quietly changed its website to remove...
[read the full post...]

March 2, 2008

Kermit The Totally Washed Up, Whoring Frog Here

It's not that easy being green Having to spend each day with total skank photographer Terry Richardson in the shop window of Colette, propped behind something Nylon Magazine calls a "Supreme skate desk," which could be cool, only I...
[read the full post...]

March 1, 2008

Yes, This Will Be On The Exam: Children's TV Show Character Names

With the news that J. Lo and M. An [doesn't work?] have named their twins Max and Emme, I think it behooves those who already have kids to list up the names of current children's TV show characters, just so...
[read the full post...]

February 29, 2008

So Let It Be Written

Baby names can come at you in the most unlikely places:Nina Foch married James Lipton, eesh, and also long ago played the woman who found baby Moses in "The Ten Commandments." The kid, Taliesin Jaffe (!!!), went on to be...
[read the full post...]

Do You Know Who Makes This Molded Ply, Fold-Down Changing Table?

Someone emailed me recently asking if there were any cool fold-down changing tables. The Man On The Television says you should just make one yourself. [Frankly, after seeing the results, I'm not convinced. "Wasted Spaces"?? You could dock an aircraft...
[read the full post...]

February 27, 2008

Curriculumachine: Drunken 70's Japanese TV Show For Kids

Ho-ly smokes. Take hidden footage from The Electric Company's off-the-hook Christmas parties, where Rita Moreno turns her skirt-shaking Anita from West Side Story into a streetwalker. Combine it with bits from Laugh-in, and intersperse animation copied straight off the...
[read the full post...]

February 23, 2008

That Would Explain The Laugh: Spongebob Musical Rectal Thermometer

At least it's not shaped like a pineapple. Musical SpongeBob™ Digital Thermometer [bd.com via cartoonbrew]...
[read the full post...]

February 22, 2008

Toyetic?? If Yo Gabba Gabba! Is Star Wars, Then I'm Steven Spielberg

Gosh, how much I love Kidscreen, the trade magazine of the children's television industry [tagline: "About reaching children through entertainment"]? I'd love it even if my boys from Yo Gabba Gabba! weren't on the cover [:)] of the big, fat...
[read the full post...]

February 21, 2008

Signs Of The Merchalypse: Yo Gabba Gabba! At The NY Toy Fair

I didn't make the NY Toy Fair this year, and it's probably just as well; the sheer volume of plastic, beeping, exploitative crap would likely send me into a new baby funk, and then I'd only be posting angry takedowns...
[read the full post...]

February 13, 2008

Speaking Of Disconnects From Reality: "My Fake Baby," A C4 Documentary

I'm sure these extra-lifelike infant dolls--which are all over eBay--have been mentioned on DT before; I'm just too creeped and/or bummed out by the whole concept to look them up. Didn't stop the UK's Channel 4 from doing a...
[read the full post...]

February 12, 2008

Johnny Cash And The Good Ol' Muppets

Times sure have changed since the good old days, when the Disney Channel didn't get uptight about rerunning the Muppets and Johnny Cash rallying 'round the Confederate Flag and singing a song about running off to Jackson when the...
[read the full post...]

It's Fun To Crochet A Muno Amigurumi, And That's How You Do It

I'm no expert, but I think if you have the Brother NC-7340 printer/scanner/fax/crocheter set up on your network, you just load whatever color of yarn you need--in this case, red-- and cut & paste this crocheting code from Craftster,...
[read the full post...]

February 6, 2008

So Much For That Whole Wii Exercise Thing

Kottke links to a collection of timelapse videos of people playing Wii, including this one of a guy golfing while holding a baby the whole time: Time Lapse Wii Videos [oobject.com, which is related to yokiddo.com]...
[read the full post...]

February 3, 2008

Boys And Their Station Wagon-Shaped Toys: Peugeot 407 SW Commercials

Just came across these commercials for the great-looking, full-sized Peugeot 407 SW [Station Wagon?], which I've never driven, but I'm predisposed to like because it looks sort of like one of my favorite cars, the Mercedes A-Class, all growed up....
[read the full post...]

January 30, 2008

Crafty Rec Room Masterpiece: Atari Breakout Pillow

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } Crafting 365 Day 010, originally uploaded by jackrabbit.etsy.com. Holy smokes, It's like I'm eight years...
[read the full post...]

January 29, 2008

Melinda Beck Did The Awesome Animations For Noggin

My old company used to create TV identity spots and animations, so I may be a little more attuned to them than the average guy, but DAY-UM, Nickelodeon's Noggin channel has some of the greatest animations and interstitial programming of...
[read the full post...]

January 24, 2008

The Baby Zebra Skin Rug Is Just The Beginning

So I'm looking at Dwell's new baby zebraskin rug [coming to Target next month, just $180!] and wondering "Seriously, is that somehow not supposed to be a reference to the skin of a baby zebra?" I worried if I...
[read the full post...]

January 17, 2008

From Willy Wonka To Teletubbies: MeFi Movie Recs For 2-3yo Run The FreakyScary Gamut

Metafilter dad Matt Haughey asked the hive to recommend some non-dark, non-scary movies suitable for a movie-loving 2-3yo kid like his daughter. So far, Curious George and My Neighbor Totoro are it:I've tried all the pixar films and they all...
[read the full post...]

January 15, 2008

Damn Straight, The 'Street's Not For Kids! That Gordon Dude Freaks Me Out!

Yeah, no one's paying too close attention, right? So if I've been posting about vintage Sesame Street for years without actually sitting down to watch the Old School episodes on DVD, no one'd notice, right? BECAUSE HOLY CRAP, WHAT...
[read the full post...]

January 2, 2008

Look For Buffy Breastfeeding! Sesame Street's Lakota Lacktivist Returns

Alright lactivists, you may now drop your placards along with your tops. The vintage Sesame Street breastfeeding clips that disappeared for a while are back on YouTube. The one above was from the mid-1970's and featured American Indian folk...
[read the full post...]

Don't Look For Buffy Breastfeeding: Sesame Street Launches Its Own YouTube

The quality's higher, the selection is much lower, there's no way to link directly, and you'll have to wait a few days for some hacker to devise a way to download them to your own computer or iPod. But...
[read the full post...]

A New Life Awaits Asimo In The Off-World Colonies And/Or Pasadena

And somewhere in The San Fernando Valley, a high school float committee chairman weeps, knowing that he will never again win The Crown Seal For Best Use Of Imagination And Innovation To Advance The Art Of Float Design. This...
[read the full post...]

December 29, 2007

Club Libby Lu-zah! 6-yo, Mom Say Dad Died In Iraq To Win Hannah Montana Tickets

Hannah Rocks! You rock! I rock! I rock? Hmmm.... In order to win the Club Libby Lu Hannah Montana Rock Your Holidays Essay Contest and get a free trip to Albany to attend a Hannah Montana concert, a 6-year-old...
[read the full post...]

December 28, 2007

Words Of Wisdom, Rugs From Mark Mothersbaugh

Archinect did a pretty fanboyish interview with Mark Mothersbaugh on the occasion of his rug exhibition at the Scion Gallery, and though there's no mention his Yo Gabba Gabba! appearances, Mothersbaugh shared this profound insight on the preference for subversion...
[read the full post...]

December 24, 2007

This Is Serious, You Have To Help Me, What Is The Kid Talking About?

A few weeks ago, the kid turned to me and goes, "Daddy, dogs are hunters by nature." I'm like, "wha wha wha??" Turns out she heard it on Zooboomafoo. So as we grapple with this idea that the kid's learning...
[read the full post...]

December 21, 2007

DT Window Shopping Roundup: Wooden Bikes, Euro Magazines, Baby Daddy Edition

Some things spotted around the web: Even though they're tacky and kind of insipid--well, the World Wildlife Federation was, the one for bigger kids, from National Geographic, is not that bad--the kid absolutely loves getting her magazines. It's mail! For...
[read the full post...]

December 19, 2007

Mo Gabba Gabba! Mo Gabba Gabba!

Mike Schneider, a self-proclaimed dadblogging media whore [he writes for Variety] and huge Yo Gabba Gabba! fan, reports that the show has been picked up for a second, full season. The 20 new episodes are already in pre-production.For season two,...
[read the full post...]

December 7, 2007

DT Q&A: "A Million Little Diapers," By Actor/Playwright/Dad John Mooney

It's Daddy Types editorial policy that there's no quid pro quo for advertising on the site. So when I saw the ad appear on Daddy Types for John F. Mooney's play, "A Million Little Diapers," my interest was piqued. So...
[read the full post...]

December 6, 2007

Are You Not Mark Mothersbaugh? You Are The Rug Artist From Yo Gabba Gabba.

Wow, LA Weekly's got a 150,000-word [give or take] article about Mark Mothersbaugh, one of the members of Devo, who has continued his creative pursuits by 1) opening a music studio that composes like every song on TV, film,...
[read the full post...]

Pee Wee's Playhouse Christmas Special, Plus Grace Jones

Except for the theatrical release of The Last Emperor and the Iran-Contra hearings, I didn't think I missed anything culture-wise while I was a missionary in Japan in 1988. I didn't realize how wrong I was. The intro to Pee...
[read the full post...]

When Was Sesame Street Cool Enough To Have Philip Glass Animations?

Seriously, Philip Glass? And all this time I thought his first project for children's television was the South Park Christmas Special. Now it turns out he did at a trippy composition for a set of animated color wheels. Did anyone...
[read the full post...]

Mr. McFeelgood? Sesame Street/How They Make Pills Mashup

So the kid's sitting on the floor, breaking all her crayons, and I'm all, "Dude." And she's all, "I want to see what's inside." And I'm all, "Do you remember how they make crayons? Has YouTube taught you nothing?" [OK,...
[read the full post...]

November 26, 2007

The Show, DVD's, And Licensed Merchandise Deals Must Go On

When you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And when you're an Irwin, everything looks like an awareness-building merchandising opportunity, I guess. Eight-year-old Bindi Irwin, who grew up on camera the family's televised zoo/set, mourns her late father...
[read the full post...]

November 21, 2007

Brooklyn-Made Organic T-Shirts By Winter Water Factory

I know, I know, throw a rock in Brooklyn these days, and you'll hit an organic t-shirt printer or a vinyl toy designer. Still, only a couple of them are on Supermarket, the flyover-free etsy alternative for the borough's...
[read the full post...]

November 19, 2007

NYT: The Street Is No Place For Children

To the eye-rolling amusement of the parents who grew up on the stuff, NY Times TV critic Virginia Heffernan writes about the ironic warning label on the just-released Volume 2 of Sesame Street: Old School:These early ‘Sesame Street’ episodes are...
[read the full post...]

November 16, 2007

DT Headline Roundup: Do Unto Others Edition

Clearing the browser tabs before a weekend with the grandparents: Chick-Fil-A manages to bum out yet another family with their freebie toys. I didn't call a company spokesman, but I expect they'd point out that, for us sinners, no meal...
[read the full post...]

November 15, 2007

Royal Deluxe II With No Cheese, Please, We're Keeping Kosher

How classic is this Saturday Night Live circumcision sketch? I get a little verklempt just thinking about it. Royal Deluxe II TV commercial [youtube]...
[read the full post...]

November 9, 2007

Sesame Street Covers Up Its Lone Exposed Breast

Well, I guess one single 1970's mention of breastfeeding on Sesame Street is one too many for today's merch-pushing execs, at least when it turns back up on YouTube. After receiving over 50,000 views in the last few weeks,...
[read the full post...]

November 6, 2007

I'm Gonna Forgive You, You Don't Need To Run

It was looking grim for a while there, but Metrodad totally redeemed himself when he took his daughter to a freakin' Laurie Berkner concert. And that's despite, not because of, scoring front row seats at Carnegie Hall. Shakin' Down The...
[read the full post...]

November 5, 2007

This Is Your Brain On Aqua Dots. Any Questions?

So far, the most chilling words to come out of the kid's mouth are "No, I learned it on [insert TV show name here]," as in:"And Daddy, dogs are hunters by nature." "REALLY. Did you talk about that at school?"...
[read the full post...]

"Like Zoids Or Transformers Or Maybe Even Bigger"

That Mr. T mention got me itching to see Nizlopi's JCB Song video again, which still makes me cry, 2.5 years later. It also reminds me that Michael Bay is not worthy to scrub the road grime off of...
[read the full post...]

November 1, 2007

OK, Seriously. Do Any Kids Watch Yo Gabba Gabba On Their Own?

The only Muno & Plex face painting I did at the kid's preschool pumpkin party was on myself. Lumpyhead's mom makes his DJ Lance Rock costume. And above, DT reader Jonathan and his East Village dadfriend were both rocking...
[read the full post...]

October 31, 2007

Making DJ Lance Rock Costumes Is AWESOME!

Orange fuzzy hats off to DJ Lance Rock Lumpyhead. Very niice. [lumpyhead via jason]...
[read the full post...]

October 27, 2007

Yo Gabba Gabba! Hoodies: I Swear, I Had NO Idea

Obviously, a brilliant design, though I gotta say, I think it works better as a t-shirt. From the Kidrobot November Releases announcement [kidrobot.com via boingboing, thanks jason] Previously: Winner of the DT DIY Muno Lisa t-shirt...
[read the full post...]

October 26, 2007

We Have A Winner...

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } Yo Gabba Gabba Muno Shirt, originally uploaded by super-structure. ...and that winner's dad has a...
[read the full post...]

October 24, 2007

Wha? They Said "Breast" On Sesame Street??

Yeah, like 30 years ago. That's when Big Bird gets a lesson in breastfeeding from the folk singer Buffy Sainte-Marie and her infant son Cody. Of course, Big Bird also has a personality, and Buffy carefully anunciates, "ve-ge-tuh-bles," so...
[read the full post...]

October 23, 2007

William Wegman's [And His Dogs'] Alphabet Soup DVD

One day I may figure out the art world appeal that William Wegman holds. But for now, all I can see is an endless array of amusing, pose-y, and ultimately pointless photographs involving his incredibly patient Weimaraners. I stopped wondering...
[read the full post...]

October 10, 2007

The Animated Nutshell Library By Maurice Sendak

My mom gave the kid Maurice Sendak's Nutshell Library for Christmas last year, and at some point, it totally clicked with her. Not just because of the stories, but because of the scale. They're a box set of tiny little,...
[read the full post...]

DT Headline Roundup: Einstein, Pumpkins, Chico Edition

News from around the browser tabs: The Washington Post has a nice takedown of the "educational" baby TV racket. Frankly, after soloing for most of last week, I have a newfound sympathy for any parent who decides to use a...
[read the full post...]

October 4, 2007

Supercalifreakin' Me Out: Baby Einstein Blocks Recalled For Lead Contamination

I give up. If you need me, I'll be eating Veggie Booty out of a lead bowl, drinking high fructose corn syrup out of a BPA-laced sippy cup, and watching the Hoobs until I've forgotten every multisyllabic word I...
[read the full post...]

Idea: Put A Child-Sized Chairry In Your Home Theater!

According to the people who follow such things, 2,000 child-sized Chairry chairs from Pee-Wee's Playhouse were made by Herman Toys in 1988. They're about 32 inches high. Like many a child star--not to mention her show's eponymous host--Chairry seems...
[read the full post...]

The Daily Show Makes Unbearably Crappy Children's Books By Talentless Political Hacks Slightly Funny

From the Aug. 2006 DT review of political consultant Jeremy Zilber's children's book, Why Mommy Is A Democrat: Zilber's only consolation--though it's one that won't help Why Mommy's sales--is that the "competition," Help, Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed...
[read the full post...]

October 3, 2007

Eyes On The Prize: The Muno Lisa

So what better prize for the unofficial YGG! contest than an unofficial YGG! T-shirt? Basically, it's made with a stencil cut from the iron-on transfer images on the Nick Jr. site. If you make one yourself--possibly because you don't...
[read the full post...]

October 2, 2007

Put'em Together And What Have You Got? Block Study Sponsor Is A Disney Licensee

This just in from the Circle of Life Department: From his research linking Baby Einstein videos [by name] to decreased vocabulary development in toddlers to his earlier findings of a link between toddler TV-watching and ADHD, to his book,...
[read the full post...]

TV-Hating Researcher's Block Company-Funded Study: Surprise! Blocks Make Your Kid Smarter

"Lead researcher Dr. Dimitri Christakis works with study blocks. Photo courtesy of Seattle Children’s Hospital Research Institute" In a recently published study commissioned by a Canadian block company [above foreground], Dr. Dimitri Christakis [above, left] and his colleagues at Seattle...
[read the full post...]

Reading Rainbow Rap, &c.

BoingBoing linked to video of an appearance by Run DMC on a mid-1980's episode of Reading Rainbow. Well, I'll see your book-rapping Run DMC, Xeni, and raise you one circa 1992 hip-hopping Levar Burton, dressed in an apparent homage...
[read the full post...]

September 28, 2007

Nickelodeon's Worldwide Day Of Play Is Tomorrow From Noon Till Three. Seriously.

Did you know it was Go Healthy Month? Yeah, me neither:Go Healthy Month will culminate with Nickelodeon’s 4th annual Worldwide Day of Play on September 29th when the Alliance and Nickelodeon are encouraging kids and families across the country to...
[read the full post...]

September 24, 2007

A DT Fill In The Blank Contest: My Name Is _! I Like To !

I've been looking for a way to honor the awesomest member so far in the Yo Gabba Gabba! Dance Club ["My name is Nathaniel! I like to dance!"], and John gave me the perfect idea in the My name...
[read the full post...]

September 23, 2007

My Name Is OJ! I Like To Steal!

IF I downloaded the first few episodes of Yo Gabba Gabba! for the plane, this is how I did it: Bit Torrent. Of course, IF I did it, it'd probably be going since last night, and it still wouldn't be...
[read the full post...]

September 20, 2007

There's A Party In My Wallet: Yo Gabba Gabba Toys Will Drop By Thanksgiving

Yo Gabba Gabba! definitely wants to be invited to the Christmas party in your wallet. Kid Robot, the vinyl toy subsidiary of YGG! production company WildBrain just announced to retailers that Yo Gabba Gabba vinyl and plush dolls will...
[read the full post...]

September 18, 2007

"Cuz That's The Z Of The Game": Richard Pryor's ABC's

Richard Pryor improv'ing the ABC's on Sesame Street is brought to you by the letter P and the number 1, P as in prudes, and 1 as in the number of PBS Sprout hosts they've booted so far for...
[read the full post...]

September 14, 2007

No Heavy Wonderpetting

The other day as we were walking out of a friend's birthday party, another dad asked me what the Wonderpets' names actually were, because his daughter thought they were something different. I'm like, "I have no idea, but I can...
[read the full post...]

September 12, 2007

CPSC: Can We Fix It? Not Bloody Likely! "Bob Our Small Parts Guy" Debuts On CSPAN

Un. Be. Lievable. What a train wreck. The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee which oversees the Consumer Products Safety Commission is holding a hearing on toy safety, toy recalls, and the utter shambles that is the CPSC and the Toy Industrial Complex's...
[read the full post...]

September 10, 2007

Hand Knit Starfleet Baby Blankie Subtler Than Most

It seems I've wandered into the web's Knerdish Knitting Knook. Samantha made a little snuggly/baby washcloth thing with the Starfleet insignia on it for some pregnant Star Trek fan/friends. [with Trek-themed music, but no Starfleet uniforms or Klingon cake...
[read the full post...]

September 5, 2007

Yo Nacho Nacho! Yo Nacho Nacho!

The student is now the master. Hector Jimenez, aka Esqueleto from Nacho Libre, was doing the Dancy Dance Time on Yo Gabba Gabba! this morning. I swear, one of these days, we're gonna wake up and find out Jared...
[read the full post...]

August 31, 2007

Hey You Girrrrrrrrrlllllls!

Andy bought this dvd on Amazon. Another reason to hate "Parenting" magazine [storkbitesman]...
[read the full post...]

August 28, 2007

BP Loves Children And Wants To Fill The Earth With Flowers.

Giant corporations exploiting adorable, emotionally manipulative fictional characters to suck every last dollar out of our wallets, while making outlandish PR claims that are totally at odds with accepted science and the dismal reality on the ground got you...
[read the full post...]

August 22, 2007

Liveblogging The CBS Early Show Segment On 'Hip, Hands-On Dads'

A little while back, CBS's Early Show called, looking for one of the "new breed of dads" they could put on TV. He had to be: hip hands-on in the NY Metro area, and willing to let CBS show his...
[read the full post...]

August 20, 2007

Liveblogging The Yo Gabba Gabba! Premiere On Noggin

It's freezing outside [in DC. In August. They call this global warming? Feh.] so the kid and I will be liveblogging the premiere of The Most Important Children's Television Program Of Our Generation, Yo Gabba Gabba!. Stay tuned for...
[read the full post...]

August 14, 2007

Mister Rogers' Nakedhood

Tom Junod profiled Mister Rogers for Esquire in November 1998. The result is something of a tour de force of "Hold my hand, Tom" journalism, which the magazine for some reason deleted from its website:The old navy-blue sport jacket comes...
[read the full post...]

August 13, 2007

Whoa. Baby Einstein's Got A Posse, Too.

And that posse wants to meet the University of Washington behind the Magic Kingdom after school. Or Else. Let it be a lesson to you, junior publicists of academia: if you call out a marquee product of a major corporation...
[read the full post...]

August 12, 2007

Louis Vuitton & Takashi Murakami Love The Little Children

Superflat Monogram [2003], Murakami Takashi's magical, animated tale of an adorable little girl named Aya and her keitai phone teaches us one of life's most important lessons: Louis Vuitton is a lovable, selfless panda with a heart of gold...
[read the full post...]

Frodo Has A Posse

Yo Gabba Gabba debuts on Nick Jr and Noggin next week [August 20, set your playdates to stun], and David Itzkoff, the NY Times' man on the weird kiddish TV beat, has an abbreviated preview/profile of the OC/LA dads...
[read the full post...]

August 7, 2007

Study: The ADHD Comes/ On Little Bear's Feet

University of Washington pediatric researcher Dr. Dimitri Christakis made news today when a study he co-authored revealed that 1yo kids fall behind on their vocabulary development by almost 10% for every hour of Baby Einstein videos they watch each...
[read the full post...]

TMX x AF1: Custom Airbrushed Elmo Kid Kicks

Whoa. These Elmogrified Air Force Ones are made to order by the Bronx-based airbrush artists of Airmagination. You may know their work from Vibe, The Source, or the collaborative mural in Fitty's crib. Personally, I'd get Elmo painted on the...
[read the full post...]

Baby Einstein, Sesame Street, Spongebob, Simpsons: Three Of These Things Belong Together

When most of the headlines about the latest results from University of Washington research into babies and TV focus on the endumbening effect Baby Einstein videos have on babies' vocabulary, are they missing the larger point? [Each hour kids...
[read the full post...]

August 3, 2007

What's? The Deal? With That? Don't Mohels Have To Sign NDA's?

Good L-rd, people, PLEASE tell me you are not out there choosing your mohels based on which celebrity offspring penises he's circumcised?! Just check out what happened to Babble contributor Sam Apple when he went chop-shopping at the JCC:Thirteen circumcisions...
[read the full post...]

August 1, 2007

Get The Hell Away From My Kid, Diego! Get The Hell Away! Mattel/Fisher-Price Recalls 1MM Toys For Lead Paint Contamination

Maybe it would be easier if all the companies left who don't sell hyper-popular licensed character toys contaminated with lead paint could please raise your hand? Anyone? Fisher-Price, whose Made in America toys we all gnawed on as children, has...
[read the full post...]

July 30, 2007

Ollie Kottke + Nintendo Mashup

Old blogger/new dad Jason answers the burning question, "iPhone, Wiimote, or newborn baby: which has the best built-in accelerometer?" [here's a hint: it's the one with the Moro Reflex plug-in installed]. Surprisingly, he doesn't make the next leap of logic:...
[read the full post...]

July 26, 2007

Hand-Knit ATHF Carl Baby Set: Combover Cap and Chest Hair Sweater

Ah, summer, when we head to the beach and the pool and spend our days frolick--Holy crap, check out that dude's shoulder hair! It looks like he's wearing a freakin' sweater! And that's just the baby. The Carl (ATHF)...
[read the full post...]

July 24, 2007

The Babies Of Otakon 2007

Over the weekend, DT's Asian Culture Correspondent Haniel and I headed to Otakon 2007, the giant Anime and Japanese culture fan convention in Baltimore, to scout out anime artists [stay tuned for a roundup of the sweet finds]. We...
[read the full post...]

July 23, 2007

Serving Size Trix Are For Kids!

You know how sugared cereal manufacturers are hyping their voluntary advertising restrictions, where they say they won't market food with more than 200 calories or 12 grams of sugar per serving to kids under 6? And how they claim they're...
[read the full post...]

July 20, 2007

Franklin Roosevelt's Jive Alphabet

One for the old folks out there. Franklin Roosevelt was the jive-talking black Muppet on the early seasons of Sesame Street. Here he is doing a call-and-response alphabet with his mother to with a funk bassline and a voice...
[read the full post...]

1,500 Philippine Prisoners Practice 'Thriller'

OK, if I ever go to prison, my only hope is that I'll be able to do my time wisely. Perhaps learn a trade, a skill, a talent. Maybe there'll be a choreographer with a varied repertoire of numbers...
[read the full post...]

July 18, 2007

Damn Earthquake Cuts Daddy Types Japanese TV Fame Short, Still At 15 Seconds

If only there hadn't been an earthquake and hundreds of injuries and several deaths and a fire in a nuclear power plant and a release of some sort of radiation cloud, my 15-second, on-the-phone interview about discovering the wooden...
[read the full post...]

July 8, 2007

Nazonazo Uta: Japanese Counting Word Game Anime

Another random find from what's feeling more and more like the smartest kid's TV show in the world, Japanese publish broadcaster NHK's Pythagoras Switch. With 5,000 kanji and 102 phonetic syllables, it's no surprise that spoken Japanese has a...
[read the full post...]

July 4, 2007

God Bless America, Even Though Our Prisoners Can't Do Algorithm March

I guess it's the Philippine equivalent of prison rodeo: 967 inmates doing a skit from a Japanese kid's TV show. Previously: Japanese TV silliness: Algorithm March (with ninjas)...
[read the full post...]

June 15, 2007

The Morrinho Project: My First Favela Playset

Spectacular. Morrinho ['little hill' in Portuguese] began in 1997 as the plaything of a 14-year-old boy in Pereirão, a hillside favela of Rio de Janiero. It's a toy model of the favela itself, constructed on an abandoned hill out...
[read the full post...]

June 14, 2007

Dad Headline Roundup: Don't Hold The Train! Edition

Brand recall: Holy smokes, 1.5 million Thomas The Tank Engine toys are being recalled for lead paint. Wooden railway stuff sold over the last two years. See the CPSC for details [cpsc.gov, via dt reader john] And the Salary.com...
[read the full post...]

June 11, 2007

Baby Beauty Pageants Ain't Got NOTHIN' On Tensai Electone Shoujo

First off, let me just say what this is: Johnny Depp appeared on a Japanese TV show, where he was serenaded--no, ambushed and stunned into submission--by four little stage-managed girls, ages 4-8, dressed in Pirates of the Caribbean 3...
[read the full post...]

June 9, 2007

L'Etat, C'est This Keith Haring Rocking Baby

image: haring.com I generally like my Keith Haring on a wall, preferably loadbearing. [Did you know the Boy's Club of NY building which had that Keith Haring mural, the one in that Sesame Street segment, was just torn down?...
[read the full post...]

June 6, 2007

DTQ: Who's The Biggest Kids Brand Whore?

A reader called me out for harshing on Maisy, and she's right; though the particular book the kid and I read was lame, it's far from the worst example of brand-brainwashing crap that the Baby Industrial Complex foists on our...
[read the full post...]

June 4, 2007

Pre-School TV's For Marketing, Or D'Oh!, I'm Nodding Along To An Amy Sohn Column

You ever have one of those parenting moments that stops you dead in your tracks, and you break out in a cold sweat? Like when you find yourself agreeing with New York Magazine sex-makes-babies columnist Amy Sohn about something? Sohn...
[read the full post...]

June 3, 2007

"You Oobi, Huh? I Design Your Eyes."

Except that his creation hasn't come back to slaughter him--yet--Hobey Ford is Dr. Hannibal Chew to Oobi's Roy. The North Carolina puppeteer was issued a design patent in 1996 for Finger Puppets, the bulging eyes-on-ring device that turns a...
[read the full post...]

June 2, 2007

So I'm Weak. Japan-Only Little Bony Plush Toys At Giant Robot

What month was it that I said the kid watches Japanese TV shows so that we can break the TV character - licensed merchandise - store aisle feedback loop? Way back in February? Yeah, well. I just ordered a...
[read the full post...]

May 30, 2007

On Sushi, Mercedes-Benzes & The South

So yesterday, while setting up for the kid's pre-school year-end pajama picnic [where the kid ate sushi and edamame with chopsticks, btw, a bit show offy, I admit], I moved a fellow parent's Volvo XC70. Smooth. And such a tiny...
[read the full post...]

May 29, 2007

Whew, I'm Not Crazy. Pancake Mountain IS The Best Kids Music TV Show Ever.

I don't know much, but I know what I like, and I don't care what you think, which, when it comes to kids, really makes a mess of the whole idea of transmitting musical taste. Still, Roger Moore's excellent...
[read the full post...]

May 24, 2007

Maurice Sendak Watches The Learning Channel

NOW I remember why I had this Maurice Sendak interview sitting open in my browser tabs for three days. I guess when I said Sendak was weird, I meant perceptive, while simultaneously making me realize how weird I am. Because...
[read the full post...]

May 23, 2007

"A Count of 10": Psychedelic Henson You CAN Show The Kid

I knew I'd seen that trippy rubber band mouth guy somewhere before. He was counting archaic, computer animated blobs on Sesame Street. Also, his name is Nobody. whoa. A Count of 10 [youtube] Also: 4 Related: Scanimate [scanimate.net]...
[read the full post...]

Jim Henson? Crazy, And Thank Heavens For It

No word on whether he was vegan, but the evidence is incontrovertible: Jim Henson was crazy. A crazy genius. Who else would go on The Johnny Carson show with three rubber bands, a roll of Saranwrap, a slide projector, and...
[read the full post...]

May 22, 2007

Happy Shiny Vegans Having Fun Without Cupcakes

Before anyone else falls for that handmaiden of the Farmer's Market Industrial Complex, Nina Planck claptrap about how vegan is no way to have a baby or raise a kid, have a watch of this documentary from Current TV....
[read the full post...]

May 16, 2007

Ellen DeGeneres Induces...Mayhem! By Giving Away 300 Bugaboos?

Let me lift the burden of uncertainty from your lives right now: you will never need to wonder, as Kerrie did in an email yesterday, "Did you see Ellen on [DAY OF WEEK OR REALLY, ANY MOMENT IN TIME BETWEEN...
[read the full post...]

May 15, 2007

Hip Hop Harry: Menace II II-yo Society

Holy Moses, what message are we sending to our kids when Tupac's dead, 50 Cent has been shot five dozen times, and yet Hip Hop Harry walks the streets unmolested? I won't be satisfied until this annoying, money-grubbing, toddler-brainwashing...
[read the full post...]

May 10, 2007

Type 52: The Baby Bugatti

Allan Stone Gallery is an old school, but low key institution on Upper East Side, which began showing works by such emerging New York artists as Willem deKooning, Andy Warhol, and Eva Hesse. One of the gallery program's unifying...
[read the full post...]

DIY Pointer Sisters Pinball Clock From Sesame Street

If you're planning an old school Sesame Street disco pinball machine/Pointer Sisters theme for the kid's nursery--and who isn't? look at all the possibilities down there--brother, has Thydzik got the DIY clock tutorial for you. [There are even cleaned...
[read the full post...]

May 9, 2007

Sesame Street Fighter: Oscar V. Barney

Your pervasive merchandising drives me crazy, and deep down, I really suspect one of your meta-missions is to help kids develop the skills required to have a deep, personal, lifelong relationship with television itself. But when Oscar makes totally...
[read the full post...]

You Want To Take This Outside, Errol?

Now normally, I got no truck with Errol Morris. Just the opposite, I'm one of his more ardent admirers. Thin Blue Line made me want to become a filmmaker. I've interviewed him and learned at his knee. And when his...
[read the full post...]

TVisqatsi, Or The Preponderance of Evidence

Before you even ask, the answer is, "No, there IS no ominous Philip Glass score that filmmaker Godfrey Reggio won't lay on top of a wordless montage of over-extended, over-aestheticized, over-seductive pseudo-critiques of our over-industrialized, over-mediated, over-networked society." For...
[read the full post...]

May 3, 2007

On The Existential And Quantitative Implications Of Yo Gabba Gabba Going Prime Time

Gen-X dads in Orange County flee the mainstream TV industry and team up to make trip hoppy indie kid's show? DJ Lance Rock looking like he left Fat Albert for Dee-Lite? Clips and trailers pop on the YouTube? It's...
[read the full post...]

April 24, 2007

Insane Katamari Damacy Wallpapers Collection

Detail: Katamari turtle, baby, and keyholder Day-um, it's as if Namco rolled a giant ball across the art world, and every cool artist stuck to it. Back in the day, Namco apparently published 82 Katamari Damacy wallpapers [for your...
[read the full post...]

Not Just ANY Plush Ultraman Doll. Plush Ultraman Pattern Doll

Sure, they're awesome, you say, but what exactly are the colors of these plush Ultraman dolls trying to tell us? The official story from Japanese toy manufacturer MegaHouse is that the Pattern Doll Series are made this way to...
[read the full post...]

April 20, 2007

Vintage Mr. T Cabbage Patch-y Dolls

From now on, I pity the fool who tries to tell me pop craftiness is a 21st century trend. In 1984, "Miss Martha Originals, through a license with Big T Enterprises, (Mr. T’s licensing company) created a pattern book,...
[read the full post...]

April 17, 2007

Dad Builds PBSKids.org Kiosk

We've expended an enormous amount of energy keeping the kid from touchscreening our laptops, so we're already doomed on this one, but maybe it's not too late for you. A dad named John loaded Firefox onto a surplus point-of-sale...
[read the full post...]

April 12, 2007

Thrashmetal Laurie Berkner Cover Band 15% Less Annoying

While you're listening to it, this thrasher teenager-in-living room cover version of Laurie Berkner Band's "We Are The Dinosaurs" is easily 10-15% less annoying than the original, but it also goes on almost a minute longer, a full 50%...
[read the full post...]

April 11, 2007

Wait, Don't Throw Out Those Old Paint Cans!

Does it explain a lot to know that Baby Boomers were apparently raised on a steady diet of lead paint, motor oil, and My Three Sons? According to Popular Mechanics [45 years, or in product safety testing and liability...
[read the full post...]

April 7, 2007

M Is For Mookie: Sesame Street - Do The Right Thing Mashup

This hilarious mashup of Do The Right Thing using Sesame Street Little People from Fisher-Price is by filmmaker-bartender-madman-Canadian Brent Pike-Nurse [damn, I'm gonna run out of hyphens on the first line] and his comedic crew. In case you can't...
[read the full post...]

April 4, 2007

UK Ch4 Extraordinary Breastfeeding Documentary

When we last heard from mompower newsletter publisher Veronika Robinson, she was writing articles about with titles like " Why I still breastfeed my eight-year-old girl." Now a segment of the Channel 4 documentary from 2006 about Veronika's extraordinary...
[read the full post...]

March 30, 2007

So What Makes/Breaks An Infant/Toddler Day Care Setup?

Whatryagonnado? Here's a quote from Emily Bazelon's article about what the results of the latest NICHD day care study really do and don't mean[study author Margaret] Burchinal points out that on average, day care for infants and toddlers is worse...
[read the full post...]

March 29, 2007

Eh-Oh! The Real World: Teletubbyland

This is the story of ten vaguely familiar-looking-but-unplaceable and desperate-for-attention strangers with undiagnosed narcissist personality disorder picked to visit a pop-up store in a limply decorated loft, have their picture taken with four even more obscure and desperate NPD's...
[read the full post...]

Hey, Chrysler! I Gotchyer Backseat TV Right Here!

You want to throw down over TV in the backseat, Chrysler? Time and place, baby, time and place. What, you think I'm not Sirius? How about right now on eBay. When it comes to backseat entertainment, the Scion xB is...
[read the full post...]

Live TV In The Backseat Of A Minivan? Siriusly?

So this is how it's gonna be? Well, bring it on. Sirius and Chrysler will offer live Backseat TV programming from Nickelodeon, Disney Channel, and Cartoon Network for $20/month. Non-stop corporate merchotainment in a minivan. Holy crap, people, it's...
[read the full post...]

March 21, 2007

Kids These Days

Growing up Mormon, we knew an above-average number of large families, up to the "Hey, now you can field your own football team!" variety. On a completely unrelated note, here's a candy bar commercial from England. [youtube via neatorama]...
[read the full post...]

March 20, 2007

"But Daddy, I NEED To Watch It Again."

Oops. I made the mistake of inviting the kid over to watch this Chris Ware animation, which was released as a preview to the new This American Life TV show that starts Thursday on Showtime. I figured, cartoons, cute...
[read the full post...]

March 19, 2007

Free To Blow My Freakin' Mind: Free To Be...You And Me

Holy Shel Silverstein! The kid picked The Giving Tree for the first time this morning. After I stopped crying, I went online to see what the hell is up with that boy, who was miserable his whole life, despite everything...
[read the full post...]

The Hotel Teletubbies: You Can Check Out Any Time You Want, But You Can Never Leave

First, TMX Elmo, now the Teletubbies. One day after the revolution, citizen parents will recognize the late 1990's as the beginning of the New Dark Ages of kidsploitation. But for now, the marketing and licensing overlords cling tight to power...
[read the full post...]

March 13, 2007

Introducing The Sesame Street Conjecture

Dr Terence Tao, 31, is a fast-rising star in the mathematics world. He did some of his groundbreaking work on compressed sensing with a colleague, Dr. Emmanuel Candès, while dropping their respective kids off at the same preschool. He...
[read the full post...]

March 10, 2007

That Praftalling Baker On Sesame Street

You kind of forget the multitude of clips that have been retired from the 'Street for one reason or another. Kermit, for example, was set free from CTW's nominally non-profit pen as part The Muppet Show spinoff [Did you know...
[read the full post...]

Sesame Street Counting Yogi Now Complete, Available In Spanish

For a long time, the version of this classic clip floating around YouTube of the transmogrifying, four-armed, counting Swami from Sesame Street was missing the first part; it started counting at four. But thanks to the efforts of a...
[read the full post...]

March 5, 2007

Help The Police, Help, Help, Help The Police

Time was, having a kid meant you could only sing along to your gangsta rap when you were driving alone. But after seeing comedian Adam Buxton's real-time-edited rendition of NWA's "F**k the Police", I'd say the times are a'changing....
[read the full post...]

Apparently, "Mah-Na Mah-Na" Means "Into The Sauna, Ladies!" In Italian

So we're watching a few vintage Sesame Street clips the YouTube this weekend, when we see a seriously vintage version of "Mah Na Mah Na" under the end credits of this 35th Anniversary montage. Apparently, it dates from 1969,...
[read the full post...]

March 3, 2007

TCR: SAHD ROTFLMAO

Saw this the other night; it's pretty damn funny. Thanks to DT reader John, who just forwarded the online version. The Colbert Report has uncovered the latest threat to The American Way of Life--AND The Laws of Nature [and...
[read the full post...]

March 2, 2007

One-Time Daddy Types Advertisers In The News

I first learned about the existence of Glenn Beck when Turner Broadcasting bought an adspot on Daddy Types, then ran a promo for Beck's hard, deep probe of online porn addiction on CNN. From the amazing awkward silence in this...
[read the full post...]

February 21, 2007

Crochet+Atari Mash-Up: Now That's A TV For The Kid's Room

Artist Christine Domanic made this sweet, sweet crocheted TV with Pitfall playing on it under her etsy handle, JackRabbit. Which does not, unfortunately, mean it is for sale. Of course, it doesn't matter for you, because if it had...
[read the full post...]

February 20, 2007

Soft, Smooth, Stop-Action Felt Video For DJ Klock

If you're ever in need of a five-minute music video to mellow the kid out a bit, there's always DJ Klock's "Theme." Klock is a hard-to-classify turntablist with a slight jazz overtone and an appreciation for the offbeat and...
[read the full post...]

February 19, 2007

Little Bony By David Horvath

This just in from the Show You Can't See and Stuff You Can't Buy Department: In a long interview with Crown Dozen in 2005 about the explosion of the Ugly Dolls phenomenon [which is only continuing, of course. There were...
[read the full post...]

February 17, 2007

In Case You Didn't Think Sportacus Was Annoying Enough Already...

On the bright side, when Lazytown comes on TV, you can turn it off. If you worked for Magnus Scheving--or if you set one single foot in Iceland, which he apparently rules with a rubber-gloved fist--there's no escape. At...
[read the full post...]

February 16, 2007

What I Got From Katsucon13: Day 1

I stopped by Katsucon 13 this morning, the big anime convention that happens to be down the street from our joint in DC. [Yes, I just called our house a joint. But after chilling at the con, my nerdmeter is...
[read the full post...]

February 13, 2007

Vids4Tots

Dutch has taken a stab at it by assembling a rather long and esoteric list of video clips. Daddy Types has gone about it piecemeal, just throwing a NatGeo African watering hole cam up here, a Patt Smith there, a...
[read the full post...]

February 12, 2007

Jot: Praise The Lord & Pass The YouTube

"The Lutherans had Davey & Goliath and I wondered what we Baptists could do for children's television," said Dr. Paul Stevens, President of the Southern Baptist Radio & Television Commission. He was talking about Jot, a series of mod,...
[read the full post...]

February 11, 2007

I Try To Feed The Kid A McNugget Now And Then, And THIS Is The Thanks I Get??

I gotta say, I don't know where to start with this McDonald's commercial. First off, they got rid of the damn pies in several key European countries, so no French, Dutch, or German dad in his right mind would...
[read the full post...]

"You Light Up My Life," By Patti Smith

Wow. When she appeared on Kids Are People, Too! [!!] in 1980, punk powerhouse Patti Smith namechecked Maria Callas and Mick Jagger as her favorite singers, and then she took a run at Debbie Boone's "You Light Up My...
[read the full post...]

February 5, 2007

"I Hog The Ground" Video By Steve & Steven: Great Ideas From, For Noggin

Welcome to the Hotel Nickelodeon. You can check out any time you want, but you can. never. le-e-eave. After making a mad and credible--hey, it had me fooled--break with children's television in order to launch his indie rock career,...
[read the full post...]

February 4, 2007

"Pre-Natal Pretties Pageant" From Mr. Show

"They have such high self-esteem, they can't wait to be born!" Mr. Show - Prenatal Pageant [youtube via mefi]...
[read the full post...]

February 2, 2007

21st Century Family Modernism By Richard Hutten

Well this is five kinds of cool right here. Designer Richard Hutten gave Dutch TV station KRO a tour of his house in Rotterdam, where he lives with his two sons. The creator of such kid-friendly classics as the...
[read the full post...]

January 30, 2007

Ikea Commercial: Dad Decidedly Optional

I'll just say that if this ad were for sale at Ikea, you would not find it in the Kids department. Ikea Commercial :: Tidy Up [youtube via dt reader grant]...
[read the full post...]

January 26, 2007

The State Of The Union Is: Baby Einsteinian

I've been trying to cut down on my GWB:WTF?? Moments for '07, so I didn't know until just now that the State of the Union address included this giant WTF, a salute to Our American Hero, Julie Aigner-Clark--the founder of...
[read the full post...]

January 11, 2007

Child Friendly Australia's Ad Campaign Packs A Punch

Child Friendly Australia is an advocacy initiative launched last year by National Association for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (NAPCAN). Their first advertisement, titled "Children See, Children Do," is aimed at getting parents--and all adults, according to the...
[read the full post...]

January 9, 2007

You Bindi, The Jungle Girl. Me Totally Not Surprised

Anyone besides me have an idea what the lead time is for a 26-episode television show? Four months after the death of her "Crocodile Hunter" father, eight-year-old Bindi Irwin is poised to step into his shoes, embarking on a high-profile...
[read the full post...]

January 8, 2007

Laurie Berkner To Large Pile Of Money: Clean It Up. Clean It Up.

If the phrase "guitar-strumming earth mother" doesn't make you fling your remote, full-on Wii-style, at your TV screen, then you may read this NYT article about Laurie Berkner and the debut of the second season of Jack's Big Music Show...
[read the full post...]

January 2, 2007

Pampers Of The World: One Of These Things Is Not Like The Others

Unpacking the diaper bag today for the first time in over a month, and I realized we had Pampers from three countries: the US, France, and Japan. The Japanese ones [lower left] are far softer than either of the...
[read the full post...]

January 1, 2007

Elmo's SAHD Joins Military, Deploys To... Somewhere

In the Sesame Beginnings DVD's, Elmo's The Dude-like dad Louie stays at home to take care of him, gives him baths, even schedules his playgroups. [Clearly, that last one is a fantasy.] Now, in a new Sesame Street special...
[read the full post...]

December 20, 2006

Tickle Me Emo

They make TV with the comedians they have, not the comedians we want. Of the few I've seen all the way through, Mad TV's gags seem about 10% funny [i.e., they go on 10x too long]. Tickle Me Emo...
[read the full post...]

December 19, 2006

This Office Party Story Doesn't Pass The Sniff Test

If it's true, then the apparently child-free Liam just didn't spin it right. Because if there's one thing a baby's good for, it's taking the blame for farts. RAISING A STINK AT THE OFFICE XMAS PARTY... [...
[read the full post...]

NYT Tries, Fails To Put Chad Pennington's Appearance On Sesame Street In Context

Chad Pennington and some of his fellow NY Jets taped a segment on Sesame Street last week. In grand "leave no metaphor unturned" sportswriting tradition, the NY Times' Karen Crouse basically tries to credit Elmo for helping the Jets recover...
[read the full post...]

December 15, 2006

Toot Toot, Chugga Chugga, Small Faded Red Car

Last summer photoblogger extraordinaire David F. Gallagher snapped a picture of an abandoned amusement park car in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. If the carbon dating tests come back positive, the photo is definitive proof that The Wiggles are descended from those...
[read the full post...]

December 14, 2006

Japanese TV Silliness: Less Ninjas, More Robots

OK, I swear, I'll stop for a while. It's just that the third day of jet lag is the toughest, and I've got the last, daybreak shift with the kid, and it turns out the National Geographic watering hole...
[read the full post...]

December 12, 2006

Japanese TV Silliness: Pitagora Suicchi's Algorithm March. Also With Ninjas

This will be the last post about ye random Japanese kid's TV program for at least several hours. If you're fed up, I'm sorry, but it's the ninjas' fault. Pitagora Suicchi's Algorithm March, solo, then together with ninjas [youtube]...
[read the full post...]

Framy The Square Dog: The Second Pitagora Book

And here I thought traveling 28 hours straight would be enough for a clean break with Japan, and yet here we are, slogging through jet lag by watching episodes of Pitagora Suitchi online all afternoon. Visiting Masahiko Sato's website,...
[read the full post...]

10 Stick Anime & Framy: Awesome Japanese Kid's Anime

One discovery last week was a pair of really beautiful, smart, and funny animated segments on an NHK kid's TV show called Pitagora Suicchi [Pythagoras Switch]. Juppon Anime [10 Stick Anime] is a story or game told by 10 animated...
[read the full post...]

December 4, 2006

Greg Wigga Gets Mad Props From Salon.com Wigga

At Salon.com, King Kaufman pays tribute to The Wiggas on the occasion of Greg Wigga's retirement:The four men, who are white, affect the personas and speech of black American hip-hop stars. Each wears a distinctive, solid-colored shirt onstage and in...
[read the full post...]

November 30, 2006

Wiggles Breakup Predicted: Not So Funny Now, Is It?

Welllll, actually, it is pretty funny. Check out Brian's 2003 report of the rock 'n roll world's stunned reaction to news that The Wiggles were breaking up. The reason: not illness, not Yoko, not drugs--though Jeff's 'lude problem was...
[read the full post...]

November 29, 2006

FLASH: Where's Greg? Wiggle To Stop Wiggling

Whoa. The Wiggles have called a press conference to make a 'major announcement.' I need a drink. update: Well, that didn't take long:Page's departure will not make any difference to the power of Brand Wiggles, the company's breakfast cereals group...
[read the full post...]

November 28, 2006

Update: Barney Caves & Pays, Does Not Admit To Being Evil

Remember how Barney's lawyers had been hounding a guy for years, trying to make him take his clearly legal parody offline? Well, they won't be bothering him anymore. The EFF sued them, and they agreed to back down and pay...
[read the full post...]

November 24, 2006

Belgian Ad Shows Limits Of Cry-It-Out

Yes, it's true. Cry-it-out doesn't work as well past age six. This Belgian commercial suggests an alternative way to avoid this scenario, but if you're reading Daddy Types, it's probably already too late for you. Note: If you have...
[read the full post...]

Capt. Picard Sings The Alphabet

So I'm supposed to tell the kid that San Francisco is the headquarters of Starfleet, the capital of the whole Alpha Quadrant, but that somehow "Zed" overtakes "Zee" in the alphabet of the 24th century? Not on this side...
[read the full post...]

November 13, 2006

The DT Elmo Nursery Project

Sure, you're sick of Elmo now, but maybe the problem's not Elmo, but you? Maybe if you had a better attitude... Maybe fighting the Elmo juggernaut is the wrong approach, a needless waste of parental energy. Maybe we need...
[read the full post...]

November 12, 2006

VW Touran: "Finally, It's Great To Be A Dad [In Europe.]"

The newly redesigned VW Touran is a Golf-based 5- or 7-seat mini-MPV that's been getting great reviews in Europe. But since no one in Malibu drives such a thing, VW's execs know there's no market in the US, so don't...
[read the full post...]

November 11, 2006

The Animations Of Oskar Fischinger: 90% Kid-Friendly

Richard McGuire is not the only fan of Oskar Fischinger's animated films, but as with McGuire's own influence, there's much more I didn't know. Fischinger was singularly focused on integrating music and visual art. And he created the abstract masterpiece...
[read the full post...]

Don't Let PBS Kids Blow Your Mind Away, Baby

Maybe it's a problem of overfamiliarity causing design blindness, but if I relax a bit and just watch, some of the graphic design on the kids' TV channels is actually pretty nice. The Noggin graphic identity, for example, with the...
[read the full post...]

November 10, 2006

Noggin Renting Jack, Big Music, Laurie Berkner To The Highest Bidder

Now Modern Day Dad's the real expert on this, but I do know that the kid will, from time to time, ask for Jack's Big Music Show by name. And since it's about 99% less annoying than The Wiggles,...
[read the full post...]

November 7, 2006

Slimy Has Two Daddies

First Bert & Ernie, now Oscar's 'roommate'. You don't need to see a dozen beautifully restored brownstones and a coffee bar to know that Sesame Street is gentrifying, but fast. [image via tvnewser, who's got the story, too]...
[read the full post...]

October 31, 2006

Just Sit Right Back And Hear A Tale That'll Blow Your Mind

So I was thinking that Mr. Howell's name didn't sound right, so I started Googling around a bit. I was right, after I was wrong, that is: it wasn't P. Was it J.? Thurston J. Howell III.? Or just Thurston...
[read the full post...]

Bad Parentwatch: My Daughter, The Junkie

I am absolutely slammed at work, with a deadline for today. The kid's off to Grandma's for Halloween, but here is what she did yesterday: Sesame Street Sesame Street Looked for the Wiggles, weren't on. Read a dozen little...
[read the full post...]

October 29, 2006

Biggest Saved By The Bell Collection EVER On eBay

If you're like me, you were despairing over how you could ever properly convey to your newborn child the important, formative influence Saved By The Bell played in your life. Without, you know, bringing up Showgirls or the Screech sex...
[read the full post...]

Breaking: Greg Wiggle Diagnosed With Darrin Stephens Syndrome

Seems that Greg Page, aka Greg Wiggle, is fairly sick. Let's hope he's actually just holding out for more creative control. But just in case, don't send those 2000 season tapes to the Goodwill just yet. You're my backup...
[read the full post...]

October 24, 2006

Creative Playthings Puppet Theater On eBay Looks Like Laugh-in

Was it something in the air? Which came first? Because this psychedelic little Creative Playthings puppet theater, with walls full of little puppet openings, is dated 1968, the same year that Laugh-in, with its joke wall full of little...
[read the full post...]

October 23, 2006

Ren & Stimpy's Dad Blames Damn Hippies For Decline Of Western Toy Civilization

As the creator of the greatest crass animation since Beavis & Butthead, John Kricfalusi knows a thing or two about precipitating the decline of civilization. Since by his count, it happened sometime in the late Sixties or early Seventies,...
[read the full post...]

October 21, 2006

Julia Louis-Dreyfus' Arrested Development Fake Pregnancy Belly On eBay

Though it is neither Swedish nor a kitten [nor a penetrating (sic) expose' into America's addiction to porn], the flesh-toned latex pregnancy belly and bust worn by Julia Louis-Dreyfus during season 2 of Arrested Development has attracted considerable interest...
[read the full post...]

October 20, 2006

Lick The Baby! Don't Lick The Baby.

Friend of DT Matt Haber did a sit-down with the Wonder Showzen folks for Radar:Chatman: But you know, the other thing is, like, we'd have to clean it off every time. It would react and cry. It's a production problem,...
[read the full post...]

October 10, 2006

Imprtant Tips For Dads #46: How To Bring Up The NFL

While there seems to be no solution as yet for the awkwardness that is a first birthday party [1], Big Daddy Drew does have some suggestions for saving the talking-with-dads-you-don't-know situation--by turning the conversation to the NFL:Bring up a game...
[read the full post...]

October 5, 2006

Is Elmo Talking To Elmo? Martin Scorsese's Sesame Streets

Not sure why Morgan Freeman is doing the voiceover for this, but it's pretty damn funny. Watch it when the kids are asleep, though, unless you really want them to hear Elmo talking like that to the fish. Sesame Streets...
[read the full post...]

October 1, 2006

Star Trek Auction: The Daddy Types Bidder's Guide

LOT 191: AUGMENT EMBRYO INCUBATOR MODULE, [est. $300-350] If you didn't already know Paramount was throwing a massive, EVERYTHING MUST GO! auction of Star Trek props, costumes and memorabilia at Christie's this week [Oct. 5, 6 &7], you probably...
[read the full post...]

September 29, 2006

Worlds Collide: Mister Rogers Playing Donkey Kong

Just what it sounds like. Apparently, there's this guy--he's a carpenter, so he has this hammer--who's trying to save this girl? Mister Rogers Playing Donkey Kong [youtube via kotaku]...
[read the full post...]

September 26, 2006

Damn! That Is One Tasty Baby Toupee

Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, provides a sweet lid to the weak through the valley of hairlessness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the savior of bald children. And I...
[read the full post...]

September 25, 2006

Bootleg Ballet Video

The kid's been on a ballet kick [sic] lately. However they emerge, it's interesting how gender coded interests are probably reinforced and encouraged by parents almost without thinking. Would she stay as interested in ballet if we didn't respond so...
[read the full post...]

September 23, 2006

This Week In Dangerous Cartoon Vegetables

More news from the front in the global war on cartoon vegetables, who threaten our children and our American Way of Life: Spinach: The Other Deadly Leaf Even though his spinach grower, Boskovich Farms, is in as-yet e.coli-free Ventura...
[read the full post...]

September 18, 2006

Ummm, Margaret Cho Is On Sesame Street On Sprout??

I guess Melanie Martinez's problem wasn't that she made a sex joke seven years ago; it's just that she wasn't famous. Completely unrelated: Cho's routine about Ass-Master. [youtube, you might want headphones at work]...
[read the full post...]

You'll Know It By Its Giant Advertisers: Nickelodeon Launches ParentsConnect.com

Who'da thought? Nickelodeon not only bought GoCityKids.com last winter [$1 million, if you're keeping score at home], they've launched what the NY Times all but calls a MySpace For Parents, but what the rest of us might call a hosted...
[read the full post...]

September 13, 2006

Holly Hobbie, Teen Mom

Big news for the 2006 Holiday licensing season:In the new Holly Hobbie & Friends series, Holly herself is the great-granddaughter of the "original" Holly Hobbie and feels a deep sense of connection to her personality, creativity and warmth. Holly...
[read the full post...]

September 6, 2006

Are You Rich Enough To Join The Producers Of Supernanny In Creating Some Real Quality TV?

Gee, all these posts about Mercedeses and I have to read about this in the blogs?We are developing a new docu-drama program for a major network about Manhattan's most glamorous parents and the issues they face living in the "Capital...
[read the full post...]

September 5, 2006

Jack & Baby Bear: The Michael & LaToya Of The Puppet World

We've only watched Jack's Big Music Show on Noggin a few times, but I had a call today, so...[click], there it was. As I watched the first few minutes with the kid, though, [who loves it, by the way]...
[read the full post...]

Taba Naba: "And Have A GREAT Time!" 4,890 Times.

This YouTube clip only shows it's been watched 4,890 times, but I swear, we've watched it that many times this week. And it's only Tuesday. "Taba Naba" has consistently been the kid's most requested video clip when she wants...
[read the full post...]

Scientists: 'Blues Clues' Teaches Your Child Important Life Skills

Researchers at Vanderbilt University have shown that by the age of two, most kids have already developed important life skills like webcamming, but are just beginning to learn how to yell at a TV screen. The study sat kids...
[read the full post...]

September 1, 2006

Outraged Yet? Links From All Over

Over at BoingBoing, Xeni's all freaked out. You'd think she'd never seen a fully illustrated, nothing-left-out, 1971 Danish sex-ed book for preschoolers by Per Holm Knudsen before. [attention t-workers: that first link starts with an illustration from the book;...
[read the full post...]

August 31, 2006

Amy Sedaris Is Snow White On Sesame Street

She's no Grace Slick, and there's enough show business insider dialogue to make me wonder when Griffin Mill is going to show up, but here's Amy Sedaris playing Snow White with seven defecting dwarves on The 'Street. Part one...
[read the full post...]

August 30, 2006

Sesame Street "Jazzy Spies"

A decade before there was Pointer Sisters pinball, there was "Jazzy Spies." Named after the ten spies who opened their coats to reveal numbers 1-10 at the end, "Jazzy Spies," or "Jazz Numbers," was the trippy animated counting series...
[read the full post...]

The Juvenilizing Evolution Of Mickey Mouse

In 1978, Stephen Jay Gould theorized that Walt Disney and his animators gradually discovered what it took evolutionary psychologists decades to prove: that baby-like features and proportions elicit an "automatic surge of disarming tenderness" in adults: The brain grows...
[read the full post...]

August 26, 2006

Or, I Might Add, Princess Leia

The kid at dinner last night: "Mommy, I want to lick you." Mommy: "No, thank you." Kid [incredulous]: "No! You are not ice cream or a lollipop!" [image of Shatner's roast via bolt]...
[read the full post...]

August 25, 2006

The Kid's Never Said Anything About Mickey's Penis

No, not that Mickey. Maurice Sendak's In The Night Kitchen has become one of the kid's favorite books to read on our trips to the library. At first, I was worried that the kid might be traumatized by a story...
[read the full post...]

August 24, 2006

Instant TV For Your Kid

Damn you, Bloglines. I've been poking around for a couple of months, trying to find a slick way to compile all the video links we use into a single, ready-in-one-click spot, so you can--or I, frankly--can find just the video...
[read the full post...]

Barney's Lawyers More Annoying, Entertaining Than Barney

The EFF filed a suit against Barney's lawyers, who have spent almost five knuckleheaded years threatening a guy named Justin Frankel [Dr. Justin Frankel, thank you very much], making dubious claims that his online parody about "The Enemy's" true nature...
[read the full post...]

August 19, 2006

Teaching The Kid Her NBC's

Honestly, I don't see an educational crisis looming in the US of A. So what if 70% of kids can't pick Iraq out on a map? The 5% whose National Guard parents just shipped out for their third tour...
[read the full post...]

August 18, 2006

Thugaboo Is...

"Thugaboo" is Marlon, Shawn, and Keenen Wayans' licensing company, MSK Merchandising LLC's..."...very first children's lifestyle property...It's our goal to create toys, books and videos that kids will love and parents can feel good about buying," remarked Keenen Ivory Wayans....
[read the full post...]

August 15, 2006

Elmo's World News Tonight

The Wide Elmo's World of Shorts. The Weekly Elmo's World News. Elmo's World According To Garp. It's An Elmo's World After All. OK, I'll stop now: They're not loving Elmo on the West Coast. In the LA Times, Joel...
[read the full post...]

August 11, 2006

Q: Could Sprout Have Fired A Nicer, Sweeter Mom? A: No, It Could Not.

The New York Observer's Rebecca Dana hangs out in Tompkins Square Park with toddler mom/Girls Club volunteer/one-time anal sex advocate--and ex-Sprout host--Melanie Martinez, who trots out her cheery greetings to the neighborhood homeless dudes. Even Mister Rogers Had a Past...
[read the full post...]

August 9, 2006

Barney Shopping Cart Saves Children's Lives--For A Dollar

How would the shorties of this world get around if it weren't for New Zealand? Think about it: Mountain Buggies, Phil & Ted's, Ents, TV Karts... The TV Kart is the most popular television-equipped, mini-car/grocery cart in New Zealand, and...
[read the full post...]

August 5, 2006

Who Can Turn The World On With Her Marketably Pink, Sparkly Smile?

Honestly, at what point do we consider Sesame Street right alongside every other company who, under the pretense of early education, uses a television show to sell your kid toys and books and videos and gear? The Times has an...
[read the full post...]

August 3, 2006

More News From The Coming Apocalypse: The Elmo's World Movie

How do you know if the journalism career isn't working out? When you interview Elmo for TV Guide and he comes off sounding like the sane one. Still, Elmo throws the guy a bone, telling him when the world might...
[read the full post...]

July 25, 2006

Tora Tora Tora

First off, let me apologize if any of your kids have been affected by that Shimajiro the Tiger toilet training video I posted last week. We have banned it in our house, starting today. Both the animated tiger and the...
[read the full post...]

Hey Sproutlets! It's Time To Say Good-- PR Move!

Executives at PBS Sprout fired host Melanie Martinez immediately after they learned--from her--that she had made a totally-safe-for-work PSA spoof called "Technical Virgin" seven years ago. PBS management want you to remember this important lesson, Sproutlets: your life can...
[read the full post...]

July 20, 2006

YouTube Is Now TheirTube

Whoa, YouTube has apparently updated their terms of use to give the company and its successors a perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to use the content you upload to it anyway they see fit. Just so you know. BoingBoing's got a...
[read the full post...]

July 19, 2006

Happy Happy Joy Joy: "Stimpy's Pregnant" On DVD

A little Ren & Stimpy chaser for your Punky Brewster DVD cocktail, perhaps? John Kricfalusi is releasing a new double DVD set, Ren & Stimpy: The Lost Episodes., lost from Spike TV, that is. Among the many tantalizing features...
[read the full post...]

Moms & Dads Are Different: Punky Brewster Edition

After the baby comes, it can feel like a full house. You try to adapt, but in a small space, everyone's just too close for comfort. You may fight over who's the boss, but it's just one of those facts...
[read the full post...]

July 18, 2006

Unidentified Man Drives A Stokke Xplory, Is Famous In Canada

And apparently, his wife has giant black spongy nipples. [youtube via cbb]...
[read the full post...]

Mike Brady, No. Uncle Jesse, Yes. The TV Single Dad Hall of Fame

From an interview Jim O'Kane did with Johnny Whitaker of Family Affair--and The Dr. Zod & Johnny Show: Of course, the fact that there were twins - - I mean, Buffy and Jody made Family Affair - I mean,...
[read the full post...]

Kid Got A Problem With Eggs? "I Love Egg" Will Help Or Hurt.

As if intent on proving that Japan doesn't have a lock on Asian Video Weirdness, some egg loving Koreans created this Flash animated song about, well, loving eggs. If your kid has a problem eating eggs, this cutey cute...
[read the full post...]

July 17, 2006

Safety: Beware Of Falling Televisions

Let your kid watch whatever you want, but just make sure the TV is anchored to the wall. According to a single Houston-area hospital's statistics, front-heavy TV's have fallen on toddlers 11 times in the last year, causing five deaths...
[read the full post...]

July 13, 2006

Japanese Toilet Training Animation-Palooza

We're right in the middle of toilet training--so far so good, and the only bribes we've been using are the underpants themselves, and the shopping for them, and the opening the package, and the special underwear box to put...
[read the full post...]

July 12, 2006

AJ Pierzynski Singlehandedly Debunks Baby-Parading Theory

More empirical proof that baby-parading doesn't work if: you're on national television. you're talking to Chris Berman. you're at the Home Run Derby. you wrap your kid's head like a Japanese gift melon. you're a total tool. "Dad, I'm...
[read the full post...]

July 10, 2006

Vintage Commercials: All Of These Things Are Not Like The Others

1) All the babies in this early 80's Huggies commercial got the kid pretty psyched. 2) All the Transoformers in this commercial might have a similar effect--on you. 3) This Grape Nuts ["The Energy Flakes!"] ad is stunning. Can...
[read the full post...]

Vintage Mr. Yuk Commercial

Safety Can Be Fun, you say? Safety can also be a scary acid trip. And for those who saw this Mr. Yuk poison control center PSA in the early 1970's, it can be a nasty flashback. Sorry. Mr. Yuk...
[read the full post...]

July 5, 2006

On The Bright Side, She IS Studying Her Numbers

The kid's buzzing around the house, asking to watch The Street, which of course, doesn't start for another 15 minutes. So I suggest to her, "How about if we let Elmer count down for us, and when it's fifteen minutes,...
[read the full post...]

June 30, 2006

Andrea Bocelli Made My Baby Cry

Andrea Bocelli, the Great Ruiner Of Weddings himself, was just on Sesame Street, singing a goodnight duet version of his one stinkin' song with Elmo. By the second verse of "Time to. Close your eyes," the kid's lip was...
[read the full post...]

June 27, 2006

Herbie Hancock Takes The Fairlight To The Street

As you school the kid in the finer points of early 80's synth hits like Ebn Ozn ["AEIOU and sometimes Y"], The Buggles, and "Shock The Monkey," you'll need to teach him about the Fairlight, the first digital sampling...
[read the full post...]

June 26, 2006

Team Eisner Buys Team Baby

ex-Disney CEO Michael Eisner's investment company just announced it has acquired Team Baby Entertainment, which makes college sports-themed educational [sic] DVD's for infants and toddlers. Among the officially licensed videos in the series so far:Baby Irish (Notre Dame), Baby...
[read the full post...]

June 25, 2006

Stevie Wonder Jams On The Street

This extended funk mix of "Superstition" by a young Stevie Wonder ends with a shout out to Sesame Street. Dig the little cat shakin' it on the fire escape, man. And then there's the Stevie Wonder remix of the...
[read the full post...]

June 15, 2006

5yo Kicks Butt On Dance Dance Revolution

"Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it." - Proverbs 22:6 [via robotwisdom, the vid, not the scripture, that is]...
[read the full post...]

June 13, 2006

Schoolhouse Rock on YouTube

I don't know at what age it's appropriate to start teaching your kid about verbs ["Verb! That's what's happening!"] or adverbs ["Lolly, Lolly, Lolly, get your adverbs here"], or whether it's right to even pretend that the legislative process...
[read the full post...]

May 31, 2006

"Daddy Dear," From The Sesame Street Lyrics Archive

I don't remember this song, "Daddy Dear," from my own days on The Street--or should I say from my first days on The Street--but 10 years ago, when a Toronto mom couldn't remember the words to sing it to...
[read the full post...]

May 30, 2006

Wow, The Only Thing Slate Left Off Is The Pick-up Lines

If you can get past the story of an STD surge at Florida retirement communities, the last Human Nature column in Slate before a two-month hiatus is a fertile field of pregnancy- and kid-related science findings from all over. Guess...
[read the full post...]

May 24, 2006

"Off To The TV We Will Go, Where We Learn Everything That We Know."

"Cuz the TV teaches us what our parents don't have time to sayyyy" In yet another confirmation of the depressingly awesome prophetic accuracy of South Park: The Movie, a mother participating in the latest Kaiser Family Foundation study on infants...
[read the full post...]

May 23, 2006

Do You Know What An SSP Smash-Up Derby Set Is?

Then you'll be having some audio-induced flashbacks when you watch these toy commercials from the 70's. Can't say I've ever played--or even heard of--The Masterpiece Game before--that's the one where you buy the world's great art at auction for $100,000....
[read the full post...]

May 22, 2006

BabyFirstTV: Uh-Oh, I'm Being Swayed

Look, I can't pretend I'm automatically and irrevocably opposed to babies watching television. I mean, the kid watched her first movie from my lap when she was not even 4 weeks old. [Granted, it was John Cassavetes' Shadows, and she...
[read the full post...]

May 19, 2006

I Wouldn't Want To Be Bob Saget At The Judgment Day

My daughter doesn't realize it yet, of course, but she's very lucky. Lucky to have been born into a household where there is no desire to film shamelessly contrived scenes of scatalogical slapstick in the feeble hope of securing...
[read the full post...]

Butterfly Ball: Catchy Tune, Trippy Cartoon, Camp/Classic DVD

So there's an early 19th century poem by William Roscoe called "The Butterfly Ball and The Grasshopper Feast." An illustrated children's book version came out in 1973, which was accompanied/followed by a legendary [if esoterically so] album of future British...
[read the full post...]

May 15, 2006

From The Makers of Free Willy: Pay-TV For Babies

Maybe the real reason only 26% of babies don't have TV's in their nurseries is because there hasn't been enough infant-targeted media to justify it. That, my friends, is about to change, thanks to the magnanimous spirit of News...
[read the full post...]

May 5, 2006

Mouse Party: Disney Kicks It Pre-Skool

Very interesting. It's a veritable boomtown in the preschool video and tv market these days, what with all the Baby Einstein, Brainy Baby educational schmeducational stuff, and the new Sesame Beginnings DVD's, and a host of independently produced options which...
[read the full post...]

May 3, 2006

Lawsuit: Videos Make Babies Neither Brainy Nor Einstein

A group with a lot of work ahead of it, The Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, has filed a complaint with the FTC which seeks to stop Baby Einstein and Brainy Baby from making any actual educational or developmental claims...
[read the full post...]

April 24, 2006

Wai Lana, Clown Princess Of Yoga

Two words: Wai Lana?? I didn't even know about this PBS yoga show until this morning, when a random Noggin story about a lost puppy sent the kid into inconsolably weepy convulsions. We'd just decided last night that her language...
[read the full post...]

ToddWorld. Excellent.

The price of liberty from primary colored tyranny is eternal vigilance. The battle over pink or blue pastels was nothing; that ends at the layette. The assault of bright red/yellow/blue plastic toys and gear and furniture goes on forever, usually...
[read the full post...]

April 22, 2006

Um, The Wiggles A) Were On Jimmy Kimmel, B) Received Honorary Doctorates

I have no idea. April 12th. That puts them one degree of separation from both Sarah Silverman and Adam Carolla [who by now should be starring in a reality show about building a crib, no?] In unrelated but equally...
[read the full post...]

April 20, 2006

It's Hard Out There For A Captain

The kid's got a cold, so we've been dosing her lethargic self up on television, including The Wiggles this morning. Where my jaw dropped at a segment from the live show: Captain Feathersword cutting loose with a rock anthem...
[read the full post...]

April 19, 2006

Sesame Street Clips Roundup - WOW

In a thread on Metafilter, a bunch of people compiled a massive list of classic Sesame Street clips on YouTube. In a serious good karma move, J.D. has organized all the links into a single blog post. Clear the calendar....
[read the full post...]

April 13, 2006

NYT TV Critic Exposes Helpless Infant To Sesame Beginnings

Words like "evil," "losers" "plopping" and "Luddites" fill NY Times TV critic Virginia Heffernan's review of Sesame Beginnings, the 0-2 DVD series that has T. Berry Brazelton looking for a touchpoint alright, right on da kisser. Heffernan plops down [sic]...
[read the full post...]

April 8, 2006

The Boy In The Newly Invented Plastic Bubble Car Seat

So Make Magazine's blog has another recap of ABC's American Inventor series. The episode this week featured a dad who invented an egg-shaped car seat that allows the baby to rotate inside it in the event of an accident. Not...
[read the full post...]

April 2, 2006

I-- Wow. Ultraman Drives An Aprica.

Taking me out . Originally uploaded by My Ultraman Daddy. When we were in Japan last summer, I tried to find some books from Tatsuya Miyanishi's Otousan wa Ultraman/ Daddy is Ultraman series, but only ended up with Daddy's...
[read the full post...]

The Wiggles Are So Nice, Only Bad Parents Hate Them

Here's a quick recap of the NY Times Magazine's love letter to The Wiggles: The Wiggles is like one big family--did you know they carry their own luggage?--who really do it all for the kids, who love them. Which means...
[read the full post...]

April 1, 2006

Wonder Showzen: Think Of The Parents

David Itzkoff [who, judging from his MySpace page, is the ur-Grup] writes about Wonder Showzen in the NY Times. There's a lot of background for the 95% of Times readers who have no idea was Showzen is, and then there's...
[read the full post...]

March 30, 2006

The Rolling Stones' Rice Krispies Commercial

Seems like the promoting they did for the Mercedes R-Class minivan is not such a stretch after all. Here is a link to the Stones' commercial for Rice Krispies from 1963. [They were working before you were even born!!] Rolling...
[read the full post...]

March 22, 2006

The Wonderful World Of Showzen

Friend Of DT Matt Haber interviewed the creators of Wonder Showzen for an article on Salon.com. Co-creator John Lee explains how, when it's in the context of shooting, the fragile-little-mind-warping things the show's child actors say are totally harmless. The...
[read the full post...]

March 21, 2006

Sesame Beginnings: Extending The Brand

You know that barebones, built-in commercial overkill and child media saturation filter that most parents have, the one that goes, "Well, if it's Sesame Street, it must be OK, right?" Somehow, after years of Elmosploitation merchandising and the Children's Television...
[read the full post...]

March 19, 2006

Warped Bulgarian TV, Vol. I: 3-yo In Big Brother House

You can see the logic, right? That it just wouldn't be right to separate a 3-year-old from her mother for the duration of her stay in the Big Brother house? Even if the mother's an ex-Playboy Playmate and former Miss...
[read the full post...]

Warped Japanese TV, Vol. XXI: Gimme Gimme Octopus

It's like HR Puffinstuff-san. Or Wonder Showzen but actually for kids. In the early 1970's, there was a children's TV series in Japan called Kure Kure Takora [koo-reh, koo-reh, tah-koh-rah, for those trying to talk the talk], which translates to...
[read the full post...]

March 17, 2006

The Boy In The Plastic Timeout Bubble

The blog for Make magazine has a recap of ABC's American Inventor, yet another reality TV show. Except for the edible snow globe (made of jelly beans and, what, coconut flakes?), it's all pretty embarassing. And then there's the Tizzy...
[read the full post...]

March 12, 2006

Would You Get Your Kid A TV? How About A Plush TV?

The whole flatscreen revolution means companies are sticking TV's in all kinds of places. Since only 26% of kids ages 0-2 have TV's in their rooms, the nursery is a prime growth market. Which is why the Taiwanese manufacturer Hannspree...
[read the full post...]

March 6, 2006

You Can Take The Wiggles Out Of Australia...

Another installment in an ongoing exercise in futility: trying to wrap my adult head around The Wiggles and what the hell's going on with their show. Here's what I understand: 1) Wiggles getting older [yet still dancing around in the...
[read the full post...]

February 22, 2006

The Kid Loves The Bollywood

Just because I complain about exploitative astroturf publicity campaigns for ineffective children's safety products being outsourced to India doesn't mean I don't like India. Or outsourcing, for that matter. Why just this morning, I happily outsourced my kid's entertainment for...
[read the full post...]

Random Data Shows TV's Just Fine For Kids

And by "TV" they mean "Milton Berle," and by "fine," they mean "didn't lower their performance on standardized high school tests forty years ago." In order to get a control group of kids who actually didn't watch television, two University...
[read the full post...]

February 19, 2006

Pancake Mountain: Serious Value For Your Parenting Dollar

I've posted before how the kid's in love with Blueberry Boy, this little animated kid who lives on Pancake Mountain. dot com. So yesterday morning, she's all asking for Blueberry Boy, Blueberry Boy, when I notice on PM's website that...
[read the full post...]

February 17, 2006

No Rest For The Wiggles? A Dad's Plea

I've been planning to devote my copious spare time to a season-by-season critical analysis of The Wiggles. Partly, it boggles my filmmaking mind sometimes how poorly produced some of the shows are, but if the kid's happy, I'm willing to...
[read the full post...]

February 10, 2006

Bitty

Apparently the whole "extended breastfeeding" thing has been around for years in Little Britain, as this clip from a BBC documentary explains: Little Britain, Series 2: "Bitty" [google video] Hmm, I assumed that it was a documentary; everyone had...
[read the full post...]

January 30, 2006

WWJD?? Veggie Tales Made My Child Cry

Now, I'm a believer, and I can totally respect a conscientious businessman closing his chicken restaurant chain on the Sabbath. The Chick-Fil-A folks are more religious than most corporate types, but they also have some great product, their people...
[read the full post...]

January 27, 2006

Hey You Guys!! The Electric Company On DVD

Weird timing, huh? A 4-disc box set of complete episodes of The Electric Company is coming out February 7th. I know that this was/is/has been [?] on Noggin in the last few years, so it's not like renovating the rumpus...
[read the full post...]

January 26, 2006

To A Child, There Are No "Strange, New Worlds"

After the Miss USA pageant, the flamers at Fark.com Googled up an old DT post about baby beauty pageants and creeped out, retouched glamour photos of innocent Southern children whose mothers won't face the reality that Designing Women is off...
[read the full post...]

January 25, 2006

Don't Eat the Pictures: Muppets Take The Metropolitan Museum

This visit of the Sesame Street gang to the Metropolitan Museum was a little after my time, frankly, but it's got rocking reviews from people who were in the demo when it was shown on TV in the mid-80's. Fortunately,...
[read the full post...]

Sesame Street Needs More Pointer Sisters

So what if it's too fast to really teach a kid to count to twelve? Maybe she'll learn some of the groove and rhythm that she did NOT inherit from her father. Either way, watching The Pointer Sisters' "Pinball...
[read the full post...]

January 24, 2006

Josh Selig: The Longterm Effects Of Being On Sesame Street As A Kid

So I'm reading Gothamist's interview with Josh Selig, where he talks about how being on Sesame Street [or "The Street," as the show's alumni call it. No, I kid. I have no idea.] as a child warped him forever. Actually,...
[read the full post...]

January 21, 2006

The Lying, The Pitch, And The Boardroom

So that reality series that ABC cancelled before it ever aired, where gay dads won a house on a Texas cul de sac after The Blacks and The Asians and The Tattooed Ones got voted off by the neighbors? The...
[read the full post...]

January 20, 2006

Wonder Showzen: Whoa

Found myself home and with the TV on on a Friday night, and so I finally caught a full episode of Wonder Showzen on MTV2. The disclaimer at the beginning says, in part: "If you allow a child to watch...
[read the full post...]

January 17, 2006

No, The Other L Word

I don't know where the line is when it comes to naming a baby after a tv character, but my gut tells me that "Labia Majora" is waayy on the other side of it. That's a/the baby's name on The...
[read the full post...]

January 10, 2006

Queer Eye For The Dad Guy

Saw this posted at the Manhattan Buy Buy Baby today. Queer Eye is looking for dads-to-be who are expecting a baby in Feb. and Spring 2006 and who live within 25 miles of the NYC area. "Let Queer Eye...
[read the full post...]

January 9, 2006

Pancake Mountain, I Wish I Knew How To Quit You

I probably should've written about these guys before mentioning Wonder Showzen [and that's assuming I should mention Wonder Showzen at all around here]. Pancake Mountain is an independent kids music TV show produced in Washington, DC by some rockers [yeah,...
[read the full post...]

January 7, 2006

Come On Down To Big Joe's Strollers Today

"This. Is A Child. Children. Sit. In These Things." This. Is A Dad. Making A Cheesy Stroller Dealer Commercial. In A Home Movie. In The Seventies. Big Joe's Strollers, 1m19s, posted by MD Davis [google video]...
[read the full post...]

December 15, 2005

Kaiser Studies Kids 0-6: Media? They're Soaking In It.

The Kaiser Family Foundation has just released the a hugely important study, "Zero to Six: Electronic media in the lives of Infants, Toddlers, and Preschoolers." It's the first ever study of electronic media that looks at kids under the...
[read the full post...]

December 13, 2005

And In Other Pregnant Skydiver News...

Until Shayna Richardson of Siloam Springs, Arka. took her first solo jump out of an airplane--and crash-landed on her face in a parking lot when her chutes didn't open, and survived, only to learn that she was two months pregnant...
[read the full post...]

November 19, 2005

TV No Likee The Children, Me No Likee The TV

I once knew a head writer for Melrose Place, and the loopier and more brazenly superficial the show's plot and character contortions became, the closer they got to how this crazywoman really saw the world. It's a realization that's stuck...
[read the full post...]

November 15, 2005

And In More Nobody's Watching Martha Stewart News

Seeing her on The Daily Show last night and reading about how her Apprentice got cancelled--sure am glad I didn't skip the birth of my child to be on a tv show no one watched--I realized I never heard boo...
[read the full post...]

October 28, 2005

It's 10:01. Do You Know Where Your Wiggles Are?

Well, I thought they'd be on the Disney Channel, since it's where they are every other day. But no. The one day I decide to talk them up, build up a little excitement with the kid, the programming geniuses at...
[read the full post...]

October 22, 2005

BBC Looking For Sperm-Cam Volunteers

"Every sperm is...a chance for you to be on British TV!" Producers for the BBC apparently want to watch your attempts to make a baby:NEW BBC SERIES Thinking about having a baby? We are looking for couples to take part...
[read the full post...]

October 19, 2005

New (Step)Dad Kutcher's New Sitcom: "30-Year-Old Grandpa"

Where DO these kids get these wacky ideas? Variety and the LA Times report that Ashton Kutcher has sold Fox on the pilot for his new sitcom, "30-year-old Grandpa," about a guy who becomes the stepfather to "a brood...
[read the full post...]

October 10, 2005

Apprentice Dad Skips Birth To Suck Up To Martha Stewart

Here's the scenario: You run a small ad agency in Philadelphia. Your kid's 5. You're wife's pregnant. You apply to be on The Apprentice with the recently-released-from-prison Martha Stewart. Then you audition. Then you audition again. Then you make the...
[read the full post...]

October 8, 2005

November 3rd: The First Million Dad March On Martha

Until today, Martha Stewart bugged the crap out of me only primarily for destroying one of my favorite houses [which also happened to be an important modernist masterpiece] through an arrogant, botched remodel. Now, though, I can get annoyed at...
[read the full post...]

Smurfed Up Beyond All Recognition

In an effort to raise money for Unicef's rehabilitation programs for ex-child soldiers, IMPS, the Belgian company controlled by the Smurf heirs, has authorized the creation of what amounts to a Smurf snuff film, which will start airing on Belgian...
[read the full post...]

I Wonder, Is Stewie Becoming A Popular Name?

The baby hurls grenades and sets traps that keep missing the target. "Damn you, vile woman" has become his signature cry, and a T-shirt slogan for the series. The running joke plays on the idea of babies as mini-despots, awaiting...
[read the full post...]

October 5, 2005

Austin Redneck Warms To Gay Dad Neighbors

Not a fan of the reality TV, but apparently ABC shot and canned a show called Welcome To The Neighborhood last year. The plot: Give a free McMansion to whoever pissed off the whitey white neighbors of an Austin, TX...
[read the full post...]

October 4, 2005

"Jane, You Ignorant Slut."

Sure, I was asked to submit some writing samples like everyone else, and I'm glad to see that one of the funniest, smartest dad-bloggers out there got the gig instead. But Oxygen TV's new Oh Baby! Opinionated Parenting blog...
[read the full post...]

September 30, 2005

Please, Kid, Don't Be A Genius

The BBC documentary Child Prodigies: Too Much Too Young? looks at the concept of "gifted" children and the other "G-word," Genius. You probably don't have to watch the show to answer the question in its title [which is good, because...
[read the full post...]

September 20, 2005

Brother, That's Grim: British Nursery Rhyme Contest Winner

Nick Jr. may be all sugar cereal and Transformers here in the States, but over in England, it sponsors dark, serious nursery rhyme contests which are won by songs of Tony Blair lying his way into the Iraq war. Other...
[read the full post...]

September 15, 2005

Other Daddies Typing, Vol. 2

There's so much good stuff out there, I might have to pick up the pace on this daddy blog roundup thing: It's cheating, I know, but I gotta start with a little meta. Metrodad gives Props For The Pops,...
[read the full post...]

September 7, 2005

It's A Wiggles World, We Just Live In It

Nothing's more important than developing a deep, personal relationship with characters on television, and that goes double for children. Which is why the opening of Wiggles World this weekend at Dreamworld, the Australian theme park which already hosts Nick Jr-land...
[read the full post...]

August 27, 2005

Bonkers: Big Brother Broadcasting Baby's Birth

They make the best strollers, some jamming architecture--and the most blatantly sensationalist TV shows in the world. What is up with Holland? The upcoming version of Dutch Big Brother will apparently have one of the house residents giving birth six...
[read the full post...]

August 24, 2005

Q. What Could Be Stupider Than Meet Mr. Mom?

Remember, there are 873 people lined up to be the king/queen of this country:Bring Your Husband to Heel Mon 22 Aug, 7:00 pm - 7:30 pm 30mins Brand new series where top dog trainer Annie Clayton helps the desperate housewives...
[read the full post...]

August 12, 2005

Reality TV Producers Try To Get It Up. Again.

"It" being a reality show about men competing to be some random woman's sperm donor. This time, it's a Dutch TV channel, and it's being called the Spermshow. [Actually, they're calling it the Spermashow, but hey.] If it sounds familiar,...
[read the full post...]

August 4, 2005

Meet Mr. Mom: Before He Gets Cancelled

Looks like I picked the right time to be beyond the reach of insipid network television. If Meet Mr. Mom teaches us anything, it's that TV execs can think of nothing worst than spending time with kids. Charming. Rebel Dad...
[read the full post...]

August 2, 2005

Or Maybe You DO Pattern Your Entire Life After TV Shows...

If so, then you're in luck, you lazy, beer-drinkin' bum. The social engineers of network television have created a cultural paradigm disguised as a TV series, called Meet Mr. Mom, And they hope it sticks. Just from this cliche-ridden article,...
[read the full post...]

Reality TV Shocker! "Experts": SuperNanny Advice Is "Simplistic," "Questionable"

I sure hope you didn't get up in the middle of the night to read this. Pediatricians, child therapists, and some of the stodgier flavors of child development experts think that those nannies on reality TV are sometimes not that...
[read the full post...]

June 16, 2005

Supernanny Superannoying

One thing the family vacation afforded us was a few minutes of Supernanny, a show about paralyzed parents standing in doorways while their children are disciplined by a surly-burly British woman. It's enough to make you want to scream at...
[read the full post...]

June 10, 2005

Have You Ever Heard of The Wiggles? heh

Those Australians are such dreamers, always pursuing some wacky, creative idea. Take these four friends [I believe they're called "mates" down there] who were studying to become preschool teachers when they decided to make something for kids, maybe a CD...
[read the full post...]

May 24, 2005

Calling All Manhattan Slackers

Manhattan Neighborhood Network, MNN, aka the public access channels that don't fill up with porn, is doing a roundtable discussion Tuesday at 2pm where bloggers "talk shop on the next wave of internet community building." According to the program guide,...
[read the full post...]

May 8, 2005

Free TiVo for your Baby

Sound like a fair trade? Have your baby at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas over the Mother's Day weekend, and TiVo will give you a free box and lifetime service. All they apparently ask in return is to just put...
[read the full post...]

May 7, 2005

Jon Stewart Seen Buying Flowers, Wine at Whole Foods

This just in a from a DT reader who's apparently unfamiliar with the ways of wooing:Just saw Jon Stewart leaving Whole Foods Union Square with a bouquet of flowers as big as he is, and a case of wine, which...
[read the full post...]

April 14, 2005

Shoot It All, Let Oxygen Sort It Out

This one's for those who hold this truth to be self-evident, who don't even think of why you'd ever ask why: If TV is like the air you breathe, you're in luck. Oxygen, the TV network for the ladies, wants...
[read the full post...]

April 5, 2005

Oobi Drive Nail In Daddy's Brain

Did I mishear the opening song, or were we actually about to watch a show with characters named Kegel and Boobie on Noggin on a Sunday morning? No, no, no, it's Oobi, and the website says his best friend...
[read the full post...]

March 18, 2005

Plot To Kidnap Letterman's Kid, Nanny, Foiled

Kelly A. Frank, a 43-year old painter in Montana was arrested for plotting to kidnap David Letterman's son and the kid's nanny. Apparently, Frank kept a key to Letterman's ranch after doing some work for him, and he planned to...
[read the full post...]

March 7, 2005

Delivery Room Prep: Are You Man Enough To Watch National Geographic?

The opening paragraph of Virginia Heffernan's NY Times review:Full-frontal images of a vagina are available on cable Sunday night, but they come at a price. You have to watch a bloody, hairy baby burst through that vagina, and before...
[read the full post...]