The cereal aisle

VIEWPOINT

By RALPH HARDIN

Evening Times Editor I ’ve been taking a little walk down Memory Lane recently.

Before I get too into it … should I capitalize “Memory Lane,” even though it’s not a real place? I feel like I should. Anyway, this year “Saturday Night Live” is celebrating its 50th season, which is crazy that the show has been around that long.

Being in my early 50s, I grew up with the show. My Mom even used to describe me as looking like “a Conehead” when I was born. If you get that reference, you’ve probably been watching the show as long as I have. While I can’t say I’ve seen every episode, or even half of them, it has always been a “comfort show” that I could catch anytime I needed a laugh or just to see what they’re doing with the state of affairs in the world.

But I’ve made an increased effort to watch this season. The show is still funny to me, even though they have continued to add and subtract hundreds of cast members over the years. I love sketch comedy and the writers do a good job, I think, of coming up with “wild and crazy” ideas, to borrow from another early SNL premise.

Well, as part of the show’s 50th anniversary (or is it birthday?) they have been airing these special documentaries on the Peacock streaming service, and I highly recommend checking them out if you have Peacock (and if you don’t, and you don’t want to add another streaming service, I totally get it. I cringe thinking about how much we spend on TV every month).

But one of these documentaries is all about trying out for the show. It’s called “Five Minutes,” because that’s how long your audition is. Literally hundreds of people have attempted to make it onto SNL, and so many have not made it – even people who went on to great fame, like Jim Carrey, Kevin Hart, John Goodman and Geena Davis.

But anyway, one of the people they interviewed for the documentary is current cast member Heidi Gardner. She is very good at her roles on the show and does it all while juggling a pretty successful TV commercial gig and a recurring role on the Apple TV show “Shrinking,” which is also excellent.

During her segment, she watches a recording of her five-minute audition and gets pretty emotional about it. She recalls that following the audition, she waited for over a week to hear back from the producers. And at one point, she got a little discouraged and down about it.

So, what did she do to cheer herself up? She went to the grocery store. Specifically, she went to walk up and down the cereal aisle at the grocery store. Why? “Because I thought it would make be feel nostalgic and remind me of when I was a kid.”

And I had never thought of anything like that, but hearing her say it, it made all the sense in the world. It’s probably very much like when I watch old cartoon clips on YouTube. Those cereal boxes do indeed have a very strong pull toward our younger days. How many mornings did I spend with Tony the Tiger, Toucan Sam, Lucky the Leprechaun or that “silly rabbit” who was always trying to get his hands on some Trix cereal? I mean, we all know now that “Trix are for kids,” but I always felt a little bad for him. Unlike Sonny the Cuckoo who at least always got a bite of Cocoa Puffs at the end of the commercial, that poor rabbit had to wait years to get a taste.

And those commercials? Strategically dispersed among our Saturday morning cartoons were the adventures of Dig’em the Frog, Cap’n Crunch, Snap, Crackle and Pop, and all their friends. Even now, as I’m typing this, I can hear the Sugar Bear singing, “Can’t get enough Super Sugar Crisp,” which is still around, although it’s now “Super Golden Crisp,” since the “s-word” is a bigger no-no for kids these days than the “s-word” that would get you smacked back in the day as a kid.

And look, I’m 51 years old, and I still eat those cereals. Like Mikey from the Life cereal commercials, “I like it.” And now that I’m grown, no one can tell me I can’t have a bog ol’ bowl of Apple Jacks or Cinnamon Toast Crunch at midnight if that’s what I want to do (although my late-night bouts with acid reflux often discourage me from doing so, so I guess being a grown-up has its own hangups).

Seriously, for writing this, I inventoried our pantry and found the following: Frosted Flakes, Cap’n Crunch w/Crunch Berries, Honey Nut Cheerios, Cocoa Pebbles, and a mostly-empty box of Mini Wheats that probably just needs to be thrown away because it’s not enough to fool with.

So, I totally get what Heidi Gardner was talking about… and while she was walking down the aisle, she got the call that she made the show, so maybe those Lucky Charms are a little “magically delicious” after all?