Space Hoppers

HAPPY BIRTHDAY POPANDCRISPS!

ONE YEAR OLD THIS WEEK WH-HOO!

Let’s play some bubblegum music and drink babysham in our hotpants.

(now, for today’s post…)

Hopping mad I was that I didn’t have one of these ingenious devices for myself as I would have bounced all day. I think we may have had one between us for a short while, or a neighbour had one, or something. Anyway I do remember there being an orange inflatable with horns and a funny face in my life at some point. Those horns got very dirty and were prone to be sucked on by younger siblings. I still remember the rubbery smell of it.

I could go into all sorts of detail about the stories I’ve heard of what uses the double-horns of the space hopper got put to, but this is a reasonably clean site so far and I’d like to keep it that way!

They were introduced in the very early Seventies, according to wikipedia, and I believe they are still available, and in different colours to the original orange. The most popular period was definitely the Seventies and the name, the image and everything about the idea of bouncing down the street in the absence of health and safety rules conjures up the Seventies for me. It is such an iconic image that it’s on the BBC cult site.

There is no other purpose for the space hopper than bouncing, as this nifty bit of youtubery demonstrates. Of course you’re always going to get the idiots. And it’s interesting how many adults play with the space hopper now, perhaps because they loved it so much as children?

I’ll leave you with Coppers on Hoppers while I go and pee myself.

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Josie Henley-Einion, author, blogger, Legend in my own Living Room

Joe 90

Of all the supermarionations, my favourite was Joe 90 which was repeated through the Seventies though it was first shown in 1968 and according to Wikipedia only one series was made. So technically if you’re going to be picky I shouldn’t be talking about it here. However, this is my site so I will.

My name being Joe (and I spelled it like that then) and having blonde hair and glasses made me a candidate for being called Joe 90 as an insult. I think it happened twice before the children who were trying to insult me realised that I was pleased to be called Joe 90 and so they stopped. Of course.

The idea behind Joe 90 was that he was the son of a scientist who created a machine called BIG RAT and these special specs that made him have superpowers and he was a the first Spy Kid.

During the opening sequence Joe was sat inside a big space-age ball, with a bells-and-whistles computer. It all looks laughable now but it definitely has the culty kitsch that will outlast computer fashion.

Personally I think the whole thing was to get kids to think that glasses were cool. A bit like Popeye and spinach. Sort of. And sell toys of course.

The supermarionations were all interrelated with some of the puppets from one show appearing in the others. Now they are having a major comeback (again) so there’s sure to be more about them soon. It’s showing on Sci Fi UK channel. Like with many of these programmes from when I was a kid, it outshines the modern equivalents by far.

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Josie Henley-Einion, author, blogger, Legend in my own Living Room

Jim’ll Fix It

Jim’ll Fix It started in 1975 and ran till 1994, though the peak of the show will always be the Seventies for me. Jimmy Savile hosted the ‘fix it’ show which was all about granting wishes for people who wrote in. There was no charity or sick kids involved in this which there would be now, it was basically whoever wrote in the funniest or cleverest wish that would get picked to have their wishes granted.

The one I remember the best were the scout troop who wanted to eat their packed lunch while riding a rollercoaster. One of the reasons this wish was so memorable was that a clip of it was used in the opening credits. I clearly remember this poor kid holding a drink bottle with straw and getting covered, but laughing his socks off. Today my memory was jogged by trying to eat a McDonald’s in the car while Alys was driving. Kind of has the same feel to it.

So anyway, another thing about Jimmy Savile was how weird looking he was. He was tiny and skinny with long white-blonde hair, dark glasses, wearing a track suit and hundreds of gold chains and rings and a freaky false laugh. He also always had a massive cigar in his hand even though most of the time it wasn’t lit. Not the sort of person most people would leave their kids with? Strangely no-one questioned that.

After people had been ‘fixed’ they got a medal on a red chain, which said ‘Jim fixed it for me’. And you can make your own badge now as well. How cool is that? Adults and kids got ‘fixes’ and sometimes other people would write in to get a fix for their friends or family. A few times I remember famous people being fixed, either because someone wrote in before they were famous or because there was a special show for famous fixes.

Jimmy was a popular DJ and carried on working as a DJ while also presenting this show. He used to present Top of the Pops sometimes, and also do a Sunday lunch-time thing that my mum used to listen to, where he would play some song from the dark ages and ask people to ring in with the name of the song and artist. He was always a stickler for the full title, including bracketed phrases that were popular in the sixties.

According to wikipedia, it wasn’t Jimmy that granted the wishes at all, but the producer of the show. So I’m at a loss as to work out what Jimmy’s role was apart from to play the sugar-daddy.

Apparently there is now a comeback show, though I’d never heard of this until I did the research for this post. That scout troop have gone back and done the ride again. Now that makes for some good youtubery.

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Josie Henley-Einion, author, blogger, Legend in my own Living Room

Servalan

Although Blake’s 7 has already been covered on popandcrisps, I need to dedicate a post entirely to my prepubescent lesbian wet dream, Servalan. I’ve been researching the Servalan wardrobe recently due to a baking project I’m working on. My lovely writer friend Susie has already beaten me to it on that score but I have some youtubery planned for the Bake 7 bunch that is entirely popandcrisps.

Weird thing about Servalan is that she was ultra-femme vamp yet psychotic murderer and I do wonder how and why I got so obsessed with her. No, really, I was banned from watching. I don’t know whether this was because I started acting like her or my lust was obvious to everyone except me. Because this obsession started long before I even knew what a sexuality was.

So is Servalan a lesbian icon? Well, the fact that there is a drag act devoted entirely to her demonstrates that she’s probably a gay icon. There is the haircut of course, Servalan being the first woman with shaved hair I saw on TV.

Jacqueline Pearce, the actress who played Servalan has according to Wikipedia, settled down in a monkey sanctuary in Africa. I probably would too if there were men dressing in off-the-shoulder dresses and pretending to be me.

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Josie Henley-Einion, author, blogger, Legend in my own Living Room

Captain Pugwash

One of my favourite cartoons in the Seventies was Captain Pugwash. Although the last series was produced in 1975 (according to Wikipedia) I remember watching it throughout the Seventies, so was probably watching repeats.

Contrary to popular urban mythology, there was no Seaman Stains or Master Bates. I do remember references to Tom the Cabin Boy being ‘the Captain’s favourite cabin boy’ but that’s about the most innuendo that I can recall.

Captain Pugwash was a pirate but a nice one, not the nasty sort. He was funny and had a lot of funny swearwords, the only one of which I remember is ‘shiver me timbers’ but Wikipedia has a nice long list.

The animation style is minimal, like cardboard cutouts that move around on fixed backgrounds. You can see this from clips on YouTube. The modern reinvented Pugwash uses computer animation which is not so endearing.

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Josie Henley-Einion, author, blogger, Legend in my own Living Room